Fig. 1

Apoptosis-related signaling in denervated rat gastrocnemius muscle. a Histological analyses of rat gastrocnemius muscles after 2 weeks of denervation (den). The non-denervated, contralateral side was used as a control (ctrl). Slow type muscle fibers were labeled with anti-Myosin heavy chain 1 antibody (red), and anti-Laminin antibody (green). × 40 magnification. b Comparison of the mean fiber area and diameter of slow type fibers in denervated and control muscle. c Labeling of DNA fragmentation using TUNEL assay in samples denervated for 4 weeks. × 40 magnification. Insert shows a high magnification TUNEL-positive myonucleus co-labeled with DAPI. d Quantification of the number of TUNEL-positive cells in denervated and control muscle after 2 and 4 weeks of denervation. e Relative expression of key genes involved in programmed cell death in 2-week denervated muscle compared to control. For all experiments, n = 6. Statistical significance was calculated using Student’s t test. **P < 0.01, and ***P < 0.001