Fig. 1.

EEP reduces ox-LDL-induced intracellular lipid accumulation in RAW264.7 cells. a Cells were treated with ox-LDL (100 mg/L) in the absence or presence of EEP at different concentrations (7.5, 15 and 30 mg/L) for 24 h, and the intracellular lipid droplets were stained by oil red O. Representative lipid droplet staining images are shown. Scale bar = 20 μm. b The average integrated optical density (IOD) of lipid droplets stained with oil red O from differentiated macrophage-derived foam cells was calculated. c Under the same conditions as in (a), the intracellular total cholesterol (TC) content was measured using a tissue/cell TC assay kit. Data are expressed as the mean ± SEM of at least four independent experiments. **P < 0.01 versus vehicle-treated control; ^# P < 0.05, ^## P < 0.01 versus ox-LDL treatment