A Simple Method to Estimate the Number of Autophagic Elements by Electron Microscopic Morphometry in Real Cellular Dimensions

Figure 1

An electron microscopic picture showing a portion of a pancreatic acinar cell with an autophagosome encircled by double line and an autolysosome, encircled by single line, along their bordering membranes. Autophagosomes and autolysosomes are usually taken as two different categories of autophagic vacuoles. For 𝑉_𝑣 data we measure the area within the membrane and for 𝑆_𝑣 data the length of the bordering membrane separating the autophagocytosed material from the cytosol. These data are then related to the size of the surrounding cytoplasmic area during simple morphometric calculations. Scale bar 1 μm.