Fig. 2
ColIITgcog mice are protected against the initial stages of surgically induced OA. a Safranin O staining and in situ hybridisation (ISH) for Col2a1, Tgcog and BiP mRNA on sections from non-operated and DMM-operated knee joints from c/c mice at 2, 4 and 8 weeks post-DMM. The presence of each transcript is indicated by the blue staining and depicted by the arrows. c/c DMM-operated knee joints exhibited an upregulation in all three transcripts, Col2a1, Tgcog and BiP in chondrocytes around the OA-affected region compared to c/c non-operated joints. Histological scores of the SO-stained images using a semi-quantitative scoring system are shown. c/c mice exhibited a significant increase in the severity of OA with time. **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001, ****p < 0.0001. b Safranin O staining of sections from non-operated and DMM-operated knee joints from +/+ and c/c mice at 2 weeks post-DMM. The insert shows an expanded view of the highlighted black box. Histological scores of the safranin O-stained images using a semi-quantitative scoring system are shown. c/c mice show significantly reduced OA severity compared with +/+ mice. Data shown as average score ± SEM. ****p < 0.0001 +/+ 2 week post-DMM versus c/c 2 week post-DMM. LFC = lateral femoral condyle; LTP = lateral tibial plateau; MFC = medial femoral condyle; MTP = medial tibial plateau. Scale bar = 100 μm