Figure 1. Characterization of shMet B16-F10 cells and exosomes.
B16-F10 cells engineered to express shScr or shMet were used to purify exosomes. (A) Representative Western blots of exosomes and B16-F10 cells expressing the indicated shRNA were probed with antibodies specific for total Met (top panel) and Gapdh (bottom panel). Membranes were cut at ~75 kDa so that Met and Gapdh could be probed in parallel. Repeat indicates the number of independently isolated exosome and cell lysate preparations from the same batch of infected cells. The fourth lane, labeled ‘Cells’ are lysate from B16-F10 cells expressing shScr. (B) Representative Western blots of exosomes and B16-F10 cells expressing the indicated shRNA were probed with antibodies specific for phosphorylated (Tyr 1234/1235) Met (pMet) (top panel) and Gapdh (bottom panel). Membranes were cut at ~75 kDa so that pMet and Gapdh could be probed in parallel. Repeat indicates the number of independently isolated exosome preparations from the same batch of infected cells. (C) Western blot bands were quantified for cells. Met or pMet levels were normalized to Gapdh, and protein expression presented relative to shScr conditions. Expression level of shScr condition was assigned a value of 1. Means reported and error bars represent SD. Results are from 3 independent biological repeats for Met expression and 4 independent biological repeats for pMet expression. Exploratory analysis: one-sample t-test on Met levels (Met/Gapdh) in shMet cells compared to a constant of 1 (shScr cells): t(2) = 8.41, p = 0.014, Bonferroni corrected p = 0.028, Cohen’s d = 4.85, 95% CI [0.55, 9.43]; one-sample t-test on pMet levels (Met/Gapdh) in shMet cells compared to a constant of 1 (shScr cells): t(3) = 8.94, p = 0.003, Bonferroni corrected p = 0.006, Cohen’s d = 4.47, 95% CI [1.02, 8.01]. (D) Representative Western blot of exosomes isolated from cells expressing the indicated shRNA probed with exosome markers Hsc70, Tsg101, and Cd63 specific antibodies. Experiment performed on 3 independent biological repeats for each condition from the same batch of infected cells. Additional details for this experiment can be found at https://osf.io/aqm2m/.