Apoptosis was confirmed and quantified in tissue sections using the TUNEL assay. Tissue sections were stained with fluorescein-conjugated TUNEL (Click-iT™ TUNEL Alexa Fluor™ 594 Imaging Assay, Thermo Fisher Scientific, USA) according to the manufacturer's instructions [21 (link)]. The number of TUNEL-positive cells was counted in 30 sections per slide.
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