Fig. 1

Periocular administration of Dex leads to elevated IOP, reduced aqueous humor outflow facility and increased ECM deposition in mouse TM tissue. a C57BL/6 J mice were periocularly injected with either Veh or Dex in both eyes once a week for 10 weeks, and IOPs were monitored weekly. Dex injections lead to sustained and significant IOP elevation. Data are shown as mean ± SD (n = 10 in each group, 2-WAY ANOVA with multiple comparison, ***p = 0.0005, #p < 0.0001). b Age matched C57BL/6 J mice were injected bilaterally once a week for 4 weeks with either Veh or Dex, and outflow facility was measured using constant flow infusion method. A significant reduction (~ 37.8%) in outflow facility was observed in 4 weeks post Dex-injected mice compared to Veh-injected mice (n = 8 in each group, unpaired t-test, two tailed, mean ± SD, *p = 0.027). c Anterior segment tissues after 10 weeks of Veh (left panel) and Dex (right panel) injected mice were immunostained with ECM markers including fibronectin (FN), collagen I (ColI) and laminin along with α-smooth muscle actin (SMA) or phalloidin. Iridocorneal angles are represented by a rectangle white box in each representative image. Increased deposition of ECM proteins and actin was observed in TM tissues of Dex-injected eyes compared to Veh-injected eyes (n = 4 or 6; TM, trabecular meshwork; CB, ciliary body)