Fig. 4
Intraspinal microglia/macrophages activation increase over time after SCI but does not differ by sex in pigs. Representative pictures of spinal cord section stained for microglia/macrophages (IBA-1 marker) at 2 days after SCI for (A) male, (B) female, or (C) laminectomy only, control animals. (D-E) Representative images of microglia/macrophages in males and females at 6 weeks post-SCI. Insets are higher magnification of boxed, injured regions in lower power images. (F) Comparison of IBA-1 + proportional area in spinal cord lesion by immunohistochemistry (IHC) revealed a significant effect of time when collapsed across sex. (G) There was no significant effect of sex at 6 weeks post-SCI. Representative pictures of spinal cord section stained for activated macrophages (CD68) at 2 days after SCI for (H) male, (I) female, or (J) laminectomy only, control animals. Notice that very few spheroid, CD68 + macrophages appear in the absence of SCI in (J). (K-L) Representative images of microglia/macrophages in males and females at 6 weeks post-SCI. Insets are higher magnification of boxed, injured regions in lower power images. Spheroid, CD68 + macrophages are densely packed within areas of frank tissue pathology. (M) Comparison of CD68 + proportional area in spinal cord lesion by immunohistochemistry (IHC) revealed a significant effect of time when collapsed across sex. (N) There was no significant effect of sex at 6 weeks post-SCI. (****p < 0.0001; 2 days n = 7; 6 weeks, n = 19; mean ± SEM) (n = 7 m/12f, mean ± SEM)