Fig. 5.

Effect of thalidomide on TNF-α/LPS-induced cyclooxygenase (COX)-2 expression in HIMEC. A: real-time PCR shows that activation of HIMEC by TNF-α/LPS significantly increased the expression of COX-2 mRNA, and pretreatment with thalidomide (10 μg/ml) had no inhibitory effect on COX-2 gene expression. B: HIMEC expressed increased levels of COX-2 protein following stimulation with VEGF and TNF-α/LPS. Thalidomide pretreatment of HIMEC had no effect on the expression following TNF-α/LPS activation.