Activated apoptotic pathways of caspase-3, -8, and -9 and Bcl-2 family members in HK-2 cells treated with MM-MVs. HK-2 cells were treated with MM-MVs and K562-MVs (10 μg/mL) and the expression of proteins was assayed by Western blotting. (A,C) MM-MVs, but not K562-MVs, significantly induced the activation of caspase-3, -8, and -9. Both U266-MVs and RPMI8226-MVs reduced the expression of total caspase-3, -8, and -9, and increased the expression of cleaved caspase-3, -8, and -9; (B,D) MM-MVs up-regulated pro-apoptotic Bim and tBid proteins and down-regulated anti-apoptotic Bcl-xL and Bcl-2 proteins. Bar graphs for (A,B) were shown in (C,D), respectively. Each value was expressed as mean ± SD of three independent experiments. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 vs. control. 2.4. MM-MVs up-regulate E-cadherin protein and down-regulate vimentin protein in HK-2 cells.