Figure 7.

The role of PREP1 on proinflammatory cytokines and antioxidant gene expression in WT and Prep1^i/+ mice. Tnf-α (a), Il-6 (b), Il-1β (c), Sod2 (d), and Atf4 (e) mRNAs were determined by a real-time RT-PCR analysis of the total RNA isolated from the aorta of 18-month-old WT (n = 5) and Prep1^i/+ (n = 5) mice, using β-actin as an internal standard. Bar represents the mean ± SD of three independent experiments, the reactions of which were each performed in triplicate using the total RNAs obtained from six mice per genotype. Asterisks denote statistical differences (* p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01).