Fig. 3

Assessment of collagen remodeling via PSR and QPLI. a Representative picrosirius red (PSR) stained aortic valves for control and pro-calcific mice at 4 and 16 weeks imaged by linear polarized light microscopy. Scale Bar—500 µm. Percentage of thin, intermediate and thick collagen fibers for the b leaflets, c commissures and d roots. e Representative images for quantitative polarized light imaging (QPLI) analyzed aortic valves for control and pro-calcific mice at 4 and 16 weeks depicting average retardation ranging from 0˚ to 50˚. Scale Bar—500 µm. Computed average retardation for f leaflets, g commissures and h roots. i Representative images for control and pro-calcific mice at 4 and 16 weeks depicting average local variance in the collagen fiber orientation. Scale Bar—500 µm. Computed average local variance for j leaflets, k commissures and l roots. m Representative images for control and pro-calcific mice at 4 and 16 weeks depicting average collagen positive pixel density. Computed average collagen positive pixel density for n leaflets, o commissures and p roots. Scale Bar—500 µm. N = 4. **p < 0.01, *p < 0.05. Mice PSR, average retardation, average local directional variance and collagen positive pixel density: Two-way ANOVA with Tukey HSD post hoc test