Research Article

An Inducible Expression System of the Calcium-Activated Potassium Channel 4 to Study the Differential Impact on Embryonic Stem Cells

Figure 5

Cardiac differentiation is increased upon doxycycline treatment. (a) The number and size of cardiac clusters arising in dox-treated and untreated cultures were evaluated and counted. Dox treatment leads to a strong increase in both number and size of spontaneously beating cell clusters 10 days after plating. Small clusters: <100 μM; big clusters >100 μM. (b–e) Expression of cardiac marker genes upon induction of SK4. On mRNA level, the cardiac specific transcripts Myh2 (b), Myh6 (c), Myl7 (d), and Hcn4 (e) are significantly elevated upon dox treatment ( 𝑛 = 4 ). (f) This is also evident in immunocytochemical stainings using cardiac specific antibodies directed against α-actinin (red). The size of cardiac clusters is highly increased 10 days after plating. Nuclei are stained by DAPI (blue). Scale bars as indicated.
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