FIGURE 2.

Rapamycin attenuates the activity of mTOR signaling, which contributes to CTGF induction in HPCs. (A) LE/6 and WB-F344 cells were treated with rapamycin at indicated concentrations for 6 h. Lysates were subjected to Western blot analysis with antibodies against indicated proteins. β-actin was used as a loading control; (B–G) LE/6 and WB-F344 cells were transfected with lentivirus carrying shRNA against mTOR, Raptor, Rictor, or scramble shRNA and Western blot analysis showed the expression of these proteins. β-actin was used as a loading control; (H) LE-shmTOR#2, WB-shmTOR#2 and their scramble control (shScramble) were co-transfected with pRL-TK and CTGF-luc plasmids for 24 h. Luciferase activity was normalized to renilla luciferase activity. Results showed as means ± SD of triplicate measurements. ^∗∗p < 0.01, ^∗∗∗p < 0.001 compared with the control.