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Figure 2 (A) Immunostaining for activated caspases in cardiomyocytes. Representative sections of left ventricular myocardium (200 to 400x). The left panel shows Apologix carboxyfluorescein activated caspase stain (white spots in panel A) and the same field stained with alpha sarcomeric actin (B) below. Most of the apoptotic cells were myocytes. One fibroblast with apoptosis is also shown (arrowhead in panels A and B) and has a different morphology. The next two panels show the effect of caspase inhibitors (caspase Rx) on number of apoptotic cells measured with Apologix staining (seen as large white bright spots in panels C and D) or TUNEL (greenish color in panels E and F). There were fewer (panels C and E) activated caspase-positive cells (panel C) or TUNEL-positive cells (panel E) in the myocardium of animals treated with caspase inhibitors than in the myocardium of animals with vehicle treatment (no caspase Rx, panels D and F). (B) Mean data for the number of apoptotic cardiomyocytes from rats with myocardial infarction treated or not treated with the caspase inhibitor (n = 8 each group).