Fig. 1.
Co-culture with umbilical cord/placenta-derived mesenchymal stem cells (UC/PL-MSCs) inhibits TGF-β1-induced fibrogenic activation of human intestinal myofibroblasts (HIMFs). HIMFs were treated with TGF-β1 (5 ng/mL) and co-cultured with or without UC/PL-MSCs at 1 or 2 × 105 cells/insert for 48 h. a qPCR analysis of the relative mRNA expression of collagen1A1 (COL1A1), fibronectin (FN1), and α-smooth muscle actin (ACTA2). The data were normalized to GAPDH expression and expressed as relative values compared with the control (n = 3). UC/PL-MSCs were seeded at 2 × 105 cells/insert. b Representative Western blots show the protein expression of procollagen1A1 (Procol1A1), fibronectin (FN), and α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) with β-Actin as a loading control. c Quantitation of Procol1A1, FN, and α-SMA from Western blot analyses (n = 4). Data are expressed as the means ± SEM. #P < 0.05 and ##P < 0.01 versus the untreated control; **P < 0.01 and ***P < 0.001 versus the TGF-β1 treatment only; †P < 0.05 and ††P < 0.01 compared between the UC-MSCs and PL-MSCs co-culture. NS, not significant