Figure 7.

HPSE promotes TGF-β release from myofibroblast-derived ECM. HMGB1 stimulated myofibroblasts were treated with OGT2115 (0.5 µM) or an equal volume of PBS for 24 hours, and then subjected to analysis of latent and active TGF-β levels. A. Suppression of HPSE activity resulted in the accumulation of latent TGF-β content in myofibroblast-derived ECM. Latent TGF-β stained in red, while nuclei stained in blue. B. Results for analysis of TGF-β release from ECM into the cell culture supernatant by ELISA. OGT2115 significantly reduced the content of TGF-β in the culture supernatant. **, p < 0.01.