Figure 2

The composition of mononucleate cells was altered in diseased mdx and Lama2 ^-/- compared to control muscles. As in Fig. 1, mononucleate cells were prepared from muscles of Lama2 ^-/- (3 week old), mdx (4 weeks or 7.5 weeks old), and appropriate age- and strain-matched control mice and analyzed by FACS for expression of Sca-1 and CD45. A. Quantitative analysis of the cell subsets defined by Sca-1 and CD45 expression in mdx and normal control muscles showed that the percentage of cells in the two CD45⁺ subsets was signficantly higher in mdx muscles at both 4 weeks and 7.5 weeks of age. B. Similarly, in Lama2 ^-/- muscles, the percentage of cells in the two CD45⁺ subsets was also significantly higher than in normal healthy muscle. See text for statistical analyses. As also noted in the text, mdx muscles contained several-fold more mononucleate cells per gram of tissue than Lama2 ^-/- muscles. Error bars represent standard deviation with n = 3. * indicates that diseased and healthy control samples are significantly different at p < 0.05 (see Table 1 for quantitative and statistical analyses).