Figure 4

Sepsis induced capillary stopped-flow and increased effective tissue volume. (a, b) Consecutive microvascular variance images of the same rat skeletal muscle capillary bed at different times during the progression of sepsis. (Variance images depict the change in light intensity at each pixel in the field of view, from a 30 s video sequence. Perfused capillaries appear as dark lines, and the tissue background is white.) Sepsis increased capillary stopped-flow, reduced functional capillary density, and increased the effective tissue volume supplied by the remaining vessels. The latter is depicted in (c). RBC, red blood cell.