The cell loss of cochlea OHCs in the Atoh1-LKB1^-/- mice.

<p>Confocal whole-mount images of cochlea in the control and LKB1 mutant cochlea at P21. Hair cells were labeled with the hair cell marker myosin VIIa (green) (A), outer hair cell lateral membrane marker Prestin (green) (B) and the cell nucleus-specific dye DAPI (blue) (C). The morphology of the hair cell cytoplasm, membrane, and nucleus looked normal in the mutant hair cells and controls except for the sporadic loss of outer hair cells. (D) Immunostaining of the cryosections of the cochlea from the midbasal region of control and LKB1 mutant mice at P21 by myosin VIIa (green) and PI (red). The images showed that hair cells in the mutant mice exhibit normal morphology except for the hair cell loss (white arrows). Scale bars: 20 μm.