Acute Hypoxic Stress Affects Migration Machinery of Tissue O₂-Adapted Adipose Stromal Cells

Figure 3

Adipose tissue-derived mesenchymal stromal cell (ASC) migration in scratch ((a)–(c)) and transwell (d) assays. (a) Representative phase-contrast images of the in vitro wound-healing assay (scale bar, 100 μm). Monolayers of cells cultured at 5% O₂ or after short-term hypoxic stress (0.1% O₂, 24 h) were scraped, and images were taken at 0, 1, 3, 6, 9, and 24 h. The dotted lines define the areas of scratches. (b) Representative curves of time-dependent wound closure (). (c) Statistical analysis of migration results (, ). (d) Targeted migration of ASCs was analysed in transwell assay. The tissue O₂-adapted ASCs before and after hypoxic stress were seeded on a membrane in the upper chamber and allowed to migrate for 24 h towards phytohemagglutinin-activated peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) or TNFα-activated endothelial cells (ECs) cultured in the lower chamber. The migration rate was defined as a number of migrated ASCs (, ).

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