Figure 2.

BGF treatment increased the synthesis of type I collagen. (a) Total RNA was extracted and analyzed for the expression of collagen in the kidney by RT-PCR. (b) GAPDH was used as an internal control. PCR products were semiquantified according to the ratio of type I procollagen mRNA to GAPDH mRNA. (b) Data are expressed as the mean ± SEM of three separate experiments. *P < 0.05 as compared to the control. (c) Western blot analysis depicted protein level of collagen in the kidney of mice. (d) Immunohistological staining of type I collagen in the kidney tissue of normal ((A), (D)), diabetic ((B), (E)), and BGF-treated ((C), (F)) mice. The rate of collagen positivity in the BGF-treated mice is higher than the other groups. Magnification: 200x.