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. 2014 Mar 20;2014:658479. doi: 10.1155/2014/658479

Figure 4.

Figure 4

Vascular responses to acetylcholine (ACh) in isolated femoral arteries of 7- and 22-week-old Wistar-Kyoto (WKY) and spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) in the presence of nitric oxide (NO) synthase inhibitor NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME, 300 μmol/L). Age-related effect on endothelium-dependent L-NAME-resistant relaxations in (a) 7- and 22-week-old WKY and (b) 7- and 22-week-old SHR. Differences between normotensive and hypertensive rats in (c) 7-week-old and (d) 22-week-old rats. Values represent mean ± SEM of 6–8 rats. SHR-7: 7-week-old SHR; SHR-22: 22-week-old SHR; WKY-7: 7-week-old WKY rats; WKY-22: 22-week-old WKY rats. Symbols have the following meanings: x P < 0.05 compared to age-matched WKY (SHR-7 versus WKY-7, SHR-22 versus WKY-22), *P < 0.05 compared to juvenile rats (WKY-22 versus WKY-7, SHR-22 versus SHR-7), and § P < 0.05 compared to maximal relaxation at ACh concentrations 0.3 or 1 μmol/L (a, b, c, d)—significance indicating release of counterbalancing vasocontractile factors in hypertensive animals and in L-NAME-treated femoral arteries from juvenile WKY and juvenile and young adult SHR.