Barium Chloride-Induced Muscle Injury Model

Wild type (C57BL/10) male and female mice 8–10 weeks-of-age were anesthetized with isoflurane, and hair on the distal portion of both lower legs was removed with Nair Lotion (Church and Dwight Co., Ewing, NJ). The leg was rinsed with sterile water and dried. The mice were injected (Becton Dickinson, Franklin Lakes, NJ, 3/10 cc U-100 Insulin syringe, 30G × 3/8″needle) intramuscularly into the middle portion of the mouse’s left tibialis anterior (TA) muscle with 50 μL of sterile 1.2% barium chloride (Sigma-Aldrich, St. Louis, MO, B0750) diluted in sterile water as previously described (Hauck et al., 2019 (link)). To serve as a control, the right TA muscle was injected with 50 μL of sterile saline. Animals were put into a warm chamber for recovery, prior to being transferred back into regular housing cages with food at the cage bed. Their health was monitored each day post injury. No animal in this study met early removal criteria. Mice were euthanized, and TA muscles were harvested 4 days post-injury. All procedures were approved by The Ohio State University’s Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee.