Intestinal epithelial stem cell compartment in A-CD.

<p><i>In situ</i> hybridization of <i>LGR5</i> transcripts in intestinal biopsies of HC (N = 5) and A-CD (N = 5). <i>LGR5</i>^<i>+</i><i>high</i> cells and <i>LGR5</i>^<i>+</i><i>low</i> cells were evaluated based on the criteria described in Material and Methods. An average of 10 crypts per sample was scored. (A) Percentages of <i>LGR5</i>^<i>+</i><i>high</i> cells (scored 3 and 4) and <i>LGR</i>^<i>+</i><i>5 low</i> (scored 1 and 2) in HC and A-CD. (B) Schema of an intestinal crypt. Position 0 was arbitrarily assigned to the cell at the bottom of the crypt, where Paneth cells are easily identified; progressive numbers were assigned to adjacent positions moving toward the crypt top. Stem cells are represented in green intermingled with Paneth cells in red. <i>LGR5</i>⁺cells were scored based on their position in the crypt. (C) The distribution of <i>LGR5</i>^<i>+</i><i>low</i> (gray) and <i>high</i> (black) in intestinal crypts of HC and A-CD. Data are represented as a mean ± SD. (*) <i>P <</i> .<i>05</i>.