Fig. 4

Myocardial fibrosis and capillary density. a Representative images of myocardial sections stained with picrosirius red and Mayer’s hemalum in all groups. The red colour identifies fibrosis. b Increased fibrotic area was detected in all DOX-exposed groups, irrespective of any treatment applied. c, d A mild, statistically non-significant capillary rarefaction could be detected in the D-CON and POST groups compared to CON or PRE, which was evident from the slight decrease in the relative number and relative area of capillaries. n number of animals per group (9 images per animal for fibrosis, 1–4 images per animal for capillary density); Statistics: Wilcoxon’s rank-sum test; numbers are p values; NS: non-significant