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Fig. 5 | Biology of Sex Differences

Fig. 5

From: A sex difference in mouse dopaminergic projections from the midbrain to basolateral amygdala

Fig. 5

Exploration of sex difference in VTA-to-BLA dopaminergic projections reveals increased bouton density in males. A Representative confocal images of coronal serial sections of BLA from male and female mice. VTA-to-BLA dopaminergic projections were labeled by tdTomato in red. The contours of BLA were drawn with grey lines according to the DAPI-stained cytoarchitecture and Allen Mouse Brain Atlas. B No sex difference in BLA size was observed (t (8) = 0.19, p = 0.85). C Dopamine axon density in BLA shows no sex difference (t (8) = 1.2, p = 0.26). D Representative binarized images of detected dopaminergic boutons (SypGFP +) projected from anterior-posteriorly matched serial sections of BLA in male and female mice. Male mice have significantly higher densities of dopaminergic boutons in BLA than female mice (t (8) = 2.76, *p = 0.0246, effect size = 1.75). The estrous stage in females was estimated approximately by vaginal cytology. All five female mice in this cohort were coincidentally in estrus at the time of sample collection. Images were acquired at 10× magnification. Scale bars represent 800 microns in A and 500 µm in D. Bars represent Mean ± SEM

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