Fig. 3.

PDGFRA depletion attenuates the differentiation ability of SH-SY5Y. (A) SH-SY5Y cells expressing either control shRNA or PRA shRNA were subjected to Western blotting to determine the knockdown efficiency. β-Actin, loading control. (B) PDGFRA-Res significantly rescued PDGFRA depletion-induced differentiation defect. SH-SY5Y cells expressing either vector or PRA-Res construct were infected with the indicated lentiviral shRNA. Cells were then cultured in STP medium for 72 h to induce differentiation, phase contrast micrographs were shown. (Scale bars, 50 μm.) (C) PDGFRA-Res profoundly rescued neurite outgrowth defect resulted from PDGFRA depletion. SH-SY5Y cells were treated as in (B). Average neurite length per cell was quantified as described in Materials and Methods. (D) SH-SY5Y cells were treated as described in B. RNA was then harvested, and GAP43 expression levels were analyzed by QRT-PCR.