Figure 7.

Effect of AREG on the AREG and EGF gene expression. (A): AREG gene expression in the epithelium derived from airway basal cells (BC) during 28 days of ALI in the presence or absence of AREG relative to the control group (mean ± SD; n = 4 experiments). (B): Sections of the airway epithelium derived from BC during 28 days in ALI in the presence (lower) or absence (upper) of AREG analyzed by IF for expression of AREG and BC marker KRT5; arrows indicate AREG⁺ BC; representative of three experiments; scale bars-20 µm. (C): AREG⁺/KRT5⁺ and AREG⁺/KRT5 cells (% of AREG⁺ cells in the AREG-treated group) in samples derived from three independent experiments described in B; p value shows significance of difference in % of all AREG⁺ cells and AREG/CK5-double⁺ cells between the groups. (D): Normalized AREG gene expression in the airway epithelium derived from BC during 14 days of ALI culture in the presence or absence of 3% CSE, neutralizing anti-AREG antibodies or isotype control goat IgG (mean ± SD; n = 3 experiments); quantification of AREG+ cells for these experiments is shown in Supporting Information Figure S7B. (E): Normalized EGF gene expression in AREG-stimulated and control samples from 3 independent experiments described in A and B. Abbreviations: AREG, amphiregulin; CSE, cigarette smoke extract; KRT5, keratin 5.