Fig. 6. Characterization of the source of Ca²⁺ during injury. (A) A schematic diagram of the wound model, illustrating that the cells located along the immediate wound edge respond first (left image), followed seconds later by propagation of a Ca²⁺ wave to neighboring cells (right image). For B and C, the average fluorescence of individual cells at various distances from the injury site (asterisk) was recorded and plotted as a percentage change in average fluorescence. (B) Absence of extracellular Ca²⁺ does not inhibit propagation of the wave but prevents an injury response, depicted as an increase in intracellular Ca²⁺, for cells immediately adjacent to the injury site. (C) Cells treated with 1 µM thapsigargin do not exhibit propagation of a Ca²⁺ wave upon injury (asterisk). Only cells immediately adjacent to the injury site show release of Ca²⁺. The images in B and C are taken from Movie 2 and Movie 3, respectively (http://jcs.biologists.org/supplemental). The horizontal white bar represents 50 µm. The intensity scale is shown, with red indicating the highest Ca²⁺ levels and blue indicating the lowest Ca²⁺ levels. Images are representative of five individual experiments.

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