Fig 1.
Mechanics in 9-month old mice.
(A) Static (Est) and (B) dynamic (Edyn) elastances in WT (white column) and Marfan mice (grey column) determined by the end-inspiratory airway occlusion method. *: p < 0.05 when comparing WT and Marfan. (C) Young’s modulus (E) measured at different regions of the lung ECM in WT (white column) and Marfan mice (grey column). #: p < 0.05, and •: p < 0.05 when comparing different regions in WT and Marfan, respectively. (D) Complex shear modulus (G*) measured at the alveolar septum of decellularized lung matrix in WT (open symbols) and MFS (closed symbols) mice. Circles represent the real part (storage modulus, G’) and triangles represent the imaginary part (loss modulus, G”) of G*. Solid and dashed lines represent fits of the two power law model to G’ and G”, respectively (WT black and MFS grey). Data are mean ± SE.
Table 1.
Viscoelastic parameters of the lung ECM in WT and Marfan mice.
Fig 2.
(A) Static (Est) and (B) dynamic (Edyn) elastances in WT (white column) and Marfan mice (grey column) determined by the end-inspiratory airway occlusion method. (C) Young’s modulus (E) measured at different regions of the lung ECM in WT (white column) and Marfan mice (grey column). (D) Complex shear modulus (G*) measured at the alveolar septum of decellularized lung matrix in WT (open symbols) and MFS (closed symbols) mice. Circles represent the real part (storage modulus, G’) and triangles represent the imaginary part (loss modulus, G”) of G*. Solid and dashed lines represent fits of the two power law model to G’ and G”, respectively (WT black and MFS grey). Data are mean ± SE. *: p < 0.05.
Fig 3.
Lung elastances before and after decellularization.
(A) Static (Est) and (B) dynamic (Edyn) elastances in WT (white column) and Marfan mice (MFS; grey column) determined by the end-inspiratory airway occlusion method in vivo and in the acellular lung scaffolds after organ decellularization. Data are mean ± SE. *: p < 0.05; **: p < 0.01.
Fig 4.
Histological analysis of mouse lungs.
Representative H&E stained images of lung sections from (A) 9-month and (B) 5-week old wild-type (WT), and (C) 9-month and (D) 5-week old Marfan (MFS) mice. Images acquired at 100x magnification and scale bar represents 200μm. (E) Mean linear intercept (Lm) of alveolar septa. Data are mean ± SE. * p < 0.05; *** p <0.001 compared with their respective WT and # p < 0.05 between different ages in Marfan mice.
Fig 5.
Airspace enlargement evolution in WT and MFS mice.
(A) Effective lung elastance (EL) and (B) mean linear interecept (Lm) of alveolar septa in mice of different ages: from newborn (NB) up to 9-month old in wild-type (WT; open circles) and Marfan (MFS; closed black circles) mice. (C) Body weight along age in MFS and WT mice. (D) Panel illustrates examples of H&E stained lung sections. Images acquired at 100x magnification and scale bar represents 200μm. Data are mean ± SE. ***: p<0.001 between WT and Marfan animals and #: p<0.05 respective to new born mice in Marfan animals.
Fig 6.
Tunica media fibers integrity in WT and MFS mice aortas.
(A) Representative images from ascending aortas in WT and Marfan (MFS) mice processed and evaluated for elastic tunica media fibers integrity. Histological sections were stained with Verhoeff-Van Gieson. Images acquired at 40x magnification and scale bar represents 50μm.(B) Elastic fiber ruptures in the tunica media of the ascending aorta. Data are mean ± SE. *: p<0.05 between WT and Marfan animals