Dye transfer assay.

<p>(A) Lucifer yellow was microinjected into single cells in a confluent monolayer and dye spread to neighboring cells after 3 min (shown as green) was visualized using fluorescence microscopy. Scale bar 50 µm. (B) The extent of dye transfer was quantified by counting the number of fluorescent cells around each injected cell. Data are expressed as mean ± SEM. Numbers above each bar indicate the number of cells injected. Significance was determined by Student’s t-test. **<i>p<</i>0.01, ***<i>p<</i>0.001. Data were obtained in two experiments with HuH7 cells included in each experiment giving, respectively, 17±2.8 (n = 8) and 11±1.5 (n = 3) cells with dye. These numbers are not significantly different (<i>p</i> = 0.24).