Fig. 6.

Metformin and atorvastatin suppress the endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition in vitro and in vivo. A–D: human umbilical vein endothelial cells were treated with or without metformin (1 mmol/l) or atorvastatin (0.1 μmol/l). E and F: human umbilical vein endothelial cells pretreated with or without metformin (1 mmol/l) or atorvastatin (0.1 μmol/l) for 12 h were exposed to pulsatile shear stress (PS) or oscillatory shear stress (OS) for 24 h. G–J: C57BL/6 mice (6 wk old) were intraperitoneally injected with or without metformin (200 mg/kg body wt) or atorvastatin (50 mg/kg body wt). At 24 h, the intima was isolated from the aortic arch area (n = 9, 3 independent experiments with samples pooled from 3 animals in each of the experiments). mRNA levels of vWF, von Willebrand factor (vWF), CD31, cadherin 5 (CDH5), α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA), cadherin 2 (CDH2), fibroblast-specific protein 1 (FSP1), and vimentin were quantified by real-time quantitative PCR. Ctrl, control. Data are means ± SE from three independent experiments. *P < 0.05 between the indicated groups.