Evaluation of CCL21 role in post-knee injury inflammation and early cartilage degeneration
Fig 2
MMD caused recruitment of inflammatory cells to rat injured knees as early as one day post-MMD.
Hematoxylin-Eosin (H&E) staining of histology sections collected from sham-operated left knee joint (A), MMD-operated knee joint collected, at one day post-surgery (B) and 3 days post-surgery (C). Dashed black squares in the left panels indicate the regions magnified at the right panels. Inflammatory cells are obvious in the synovium of MMD-knee joint with abundant granulocytes (black arrows) and mononuclear cells (open arrowheads) at one day post-surgery. D. Cell density quantification at one and three days post-MMD in the synovial tissue of rat knee joints. Nuclei were counted in 2 fields per histology section, close to articular cartilage. 3 histology sections were evaluated from each knee. The sections were chosen in approximately the same knee joint area for comparison. We have counted the number of nuclei per mm2 synovial space in the MMD-operated right (Rk) knees and contralateral left knee (Lk) joints. Data are presented as mean ± SE, n = 6 right knees (Rk), *P<0.05 vs Lk sham-operated, #P<0.05 between Rks of 1d- and 3d- post surgery.