Table 3.

Correlations between the expression of TGF-β/MAPK signaling pathway-related proteins and mast cell number, levels of inflammatory cytokines, and inhibition of cell growth

	Mast cell number	IL-2	IL-4	IL-10	TNF-α	IFN-γ	Inhibition rate
TGFβ	0.991*	0.994*	0.970*	0.975*	0.935*	0.978*	0.991*
CTGF	0.940*	0.964*	0.916*	0.913*	0.950*	0.959*	0.940*
p-/Smad2/3	0.949*	0.918*	0.922*	0.922*	0.806*	0.882*	0.949*
p-/JNK	0.966*	0.976*	0.954*	0.956*	0.930*	0.968*	0.966*
p-/c-jun	0.991*	0.981*	0.965*	0.969*	0.915*	0.958*	0.991*
p-/ERK1/2	0.980*	0.989*	0.968*	0.969*	0.949*	0.979*	0.980*
p-/p38	0.877*	0.925*	0.890*	0.886*	0.934*	0.938*	0.877*

Note: IL, interleukin; TNF-α, tumor necrosis factor-α; IFN-γ, interferon-γ; TGF-β, transforming growth factor-β; CTGF, connective tissue growth factor; JNK, c-Jun N-terminal kinase; ERK, extracellular signal-regulated kinase;

^* P < 0.05.