Fig. 4

Effects of subretinally transplanted cells on retinal structure and vision of the Rho^P23H/+ mice. a Comparisons of the number of nuclei per column in the ONL between cell-transplanted retinas (treated) and PBS controls. b Optokinetic responses of the retina transplanted with different primary cells over the next 4 weeks after transplantation. The paired two-tail Student’s t test was performed and statistical significance was marked for different cell transplantations compared to the pooled PBS control. c Proliferation rates of different cell types in culture. A representative image of frozen sections of retinas grafted with d PBS control, e MEFs, f MGCs, and g RPE cells. h Activation of the PI3K/Akt pathway was detected by WB in SDSCs. SDSCs, sphere-derived stem cells; MEFs, mouse embryonic fibroblasts; MGCs, Müller glial cells; RPEs, retinal pigment epithelial cells; p-Akt, phosphor-Akt at site Ser473. i A diagram depicting two possible signaling pathways through activation of Akt, leading to the survival of the remaining photoreceptor cell of the degenerating retina and/or the transplanted cells. “???” indicates an unknown ligand(s) and the green-colored proteins were investigated in this study. Statistically significant at *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, and ***p < 0.001. White arrows indicate possible transplanted cells