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. 2018 Jun 19;8:9372. doi: 10.1038/s41598-018-27656-y

Figure 5.

Figure 5

Hepatic stellate cell activation in vitro and in vivo. (A) Cultured LX-2 HSCs were treated for 48 h with 10 µM RIO or vehicle, followed by RT-PCR of αSMA mRNA expression. RIO caused a mild but significant decrease in αSMA expression compared to controls. (B) Hepatic αSMA protein content was measured by western blotting. It tended to be lower in early BDL rats treated with RIO, while no significant changes were seen in rats with advanced BDL. (C) The αSMA positive stained area of liver slides from BDL rats was lower in the RIO group, attaining statistical significance in the early setting and also showing a decreasing trend in the advanced disease model. (D) Yet, hepatic αSMA stainings from CCl4 cirrhotic rats showed no significant changes after RIO treatment. Full-length blots of the cropped lines [s, t] are presented in Supplementary Figure S5. Ψp < 0.05 10 µM RIO vs. vehicle control; *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001 vs. BDL-VEH, #p < 0.05, ##p < 0.01, ###p < 0.001 vs. CCl4-VEH; two-sided unpaired t-test; n = 6 per group in panel A; n = 2-3 per group in panel B; n = 5–8 per group in panel C - according to Table 1; n = 3–7 per group in panel D - according to Table 1.