Figure 4.

Effects of pro-inflammatory mediators on NGAL expression by term trophoblast cells as measured by western blot analysis. Term trophoblast cells on day 1 (cytotrophoblast) and day 4 of culture (syncytiotrophoblast) were treated for 24 hours with or without IL-1β (1 ng/mL), TNFα (1 ng/mL), or LPS (2.5 U/mL), and NGAL expression determined by western blot analysis as described in the Materials and Methods section. A representative western blot is shown [A]. To quantify the results, the intensity of the NGAL bands was corrected for expression of the housekeeping protein, heat shock protein-90 (HSP-90). Data are presented as mean ± SEM from 4 separate experiments [B]. Statistical differences are shown. Abbreviations: IL-1b, interleukin-1b; LPS, lipopolysaccharide; NS, not significant; TNFα, tumor necrosis factor-α.