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Morphometric analysis of bleomycin‐induced alveolar epithelium type 2 cell injury and cell shape changes during repair in murine lungs
Author(s) -
Wang Ping Ming,
Martin William J
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.24.1_supplement.111.7
Subject(s) - bleomycin , lung , pathology , cell , andrology , biology , medicine , chemistry , chemotherapy , genetics
Bleomycin is known to induce diffuse alveolar damage including injury to alveolar type 2 epithelial (AT2) cells, the progenitor cell for the alveolar type 1 cell. There is a need to quantitatively assess injury to alveolar epithelial cells. To address this, we performed morphometric analysis of lung tissue from female mice given bleomycin (3.33 U/kg) or saline intratracheally. Lung were isolated and cryosectioned at day 2, 4, 7, 9, 11, or 14 post bleomycin. We identified AT2 cells immunostained with anti‐pro‐SPC and quantified the pro‐SPC (+) cells using image software (MetaMorph) from 8 randomly selected regions of lung sections. Average AT2 cell counts were markedly reduced 27–43% from the control level at day 2, 4, 9, and 11 post bleomycin (P<0.05, n=4 for each time point). These were consistent with morphologic evidence of bleomycin induced alveolar epithelial injury. However, the total pixel area per imaging region, average pixel area, and length of individual SPC (+) AT2 cells increased from day 2 to 14 post bleomycin (P<0.05, ANOVA) and the shape factor decreased (P<0.0001, ANOVA), consistent with morphologic transition of many AT2 cells from a cuboidal shape to the more flattened shape of AT1 cells. Our results suggest that bleomycin‐induced acute lung injury and repair can be quantified at the cellular level that may permit an improved approach to dissecting the underlying mechanisms of injury and repair.