Fig. 4.

Piezo1 channel mediates mechanically evoked currents in HMVEC. a Stacked bar chart illustrating the membrane fatty acid distribution in N2A cells and HMVEC, as determined by LC-MS. Bars are mean ± SD. n is denoted above the x-axis. Mann–Whitney test. b Representative whole-cell patch-clamp recordings (at ±60 mV) of HMVEC (top) elicited by mechanical stimulation (bottom). Red arrow highlights the steady-state currents. c Current–voltage relationship of HMVEC mechano-dependent currents as determined by whole-cell patch-clamp experiments. Circles are mean ± SD. n = 5. d Left: representative micrographs of HMVEC challenged with control buffer and 2 µM Yoda1 and analyzed for their responses using Ca²⁺ imaging (Fluo-4 AM); color bar indicates relative change in fluorescence intensity. White bar represents 50 µm. Middle: representative traces corresponding to intensity changes (ΔF/F) of individual cells shown in left panel. Right: mean fluorescence intensity values (ΔF/F) of HMVEC perfused with control solution (t = 30 s), Yoda1 (t = 250 s), and washed with control solution (t = 500 s). Bars are mean ± SD. n is denoted above the plot. Friedman test. e Left: representative HMVEC mechano-dependent current densities transfected with scrambled or Piezo1 siRNA elicited by mechanical stimulation at −60 mV under the whole-cell patch-clamp configuration. Right: boxplots show the mean, median, and the 75th to 25th percentiles of mechano-dependent currents densities obtained by whole-cell patch-clamp recordings of scrambled or Piezo1 siRNAs transfected HMVEC. n is denoted above the x-axis. Unpaired t-test. Asterisks indicate values significantly different from control (^∗∗∗p < 0.001) and n.s. indicates not significantly different from the control