The effects of B7-33 vs. L-B7-33 on myofibroblast differentiation in vitro. (A) Representative Western blots of α-SMA expression and corresponding GAPDH expression from unstimulated BJ3 human dermal fibroblasts, TGF-β1 (T)-stimulated BJ3 human dermal myofibroblasts and T + B7-33- or T + L-B7-33-treated myofibroblasts after 3 days (D3); and T + B7-33- or T + L-B7-33-treated myofibroblasts after 5 days (D5), 7 days (D7), 10 days (D10) or 14 days (D14). (B) Also shown are the mean ± SEM levels of a-SMA expression from each treatment group, corrected for GAPDH loading and expressed relative to the unstimulated cell control group, which was expressed as 1 in each case; from n = 6 separate experiments conducted in duplicate. Statistical analysis: p < 0.05, * p < 0.01 vs. untreated (D3) group; #
p < 0.05 vs. TGF- b1 [T] (D3) group; +
p < 0.05 vs. T+B7-33 or T+L-B7-33 (D3) group, as determined using a non-parametric Kruskal Wallis test and Dunn’s post-hoc analysis to allow for multiple comparisons between the groups.