Figure 6.

Postnatal developmental expression pattern of Eppin (epididymal protease inhibitor) transcripts in rat testis. Representative reverse transcriptase PCR (RT-PCR) assay of Eppin in testicular samples from 1-(D1), 5-(D5), 7-(D7), 10-(D10), 15-(D15), 30-(D30) and 60-day-old (D60) rats are presented (A). The molecular weight was indicated on the right. Semiquantitative data on the expression levels of the targets in rat testis along postnatal development are shown (B). We collected testis samples from several animals (at least three rats) at each age point and mixed them together as one sample. Each mixed sample was detected thrice simultaneously by real-time PCR. Relative levels were obtained in each sample by normalization to Gapdh. For presentation of data, expression level in the 1-day-old sample was taken as one unit and the others were normalized accordingly, thus allowing semiquantitative comparison. Values are the mean ± s.e.m. of the three readings at each age point. Groups with different superscript letters are statistically different (P < 0.05, ANOVA [analysis of variance] followed by Student–Neuman–Keuls test).