Figure 5.

17β-Estradiol up-regulates Bcl-x without affecting Bax in postnatal rat DRG cultures. P4 DRG neurons were cultured for 2 days as indicated in the figure. Cell lysates were prepared, and an equal amount of proteins was subjected to Western blotting as described in Materials and Methods. (A and D) Bcl-x protein (26 kDa). (B) Bax protein (21 kDa). (C) Quantification was done by using a digitized image analyses system, and values were compared with controls set to 1 (n = 3). C, control; E2, 1 nM 17β-estradiol; TX, 100 nM tamoxifen; NGF, 50 ng/ml NGF.