Figure 1.

β-adrenergic receptor activation increases MMP-9 release from cultured neurons, and MMP-9 levels are increased in brain lysates from VFX-treated animals. A, The nonselective β-adrenergic agonist isoproterenol stimulated a significant increase in the release of MMP-9 from cultures of murine hippocampal neurons (n = 5 or 6 biological replicates, p = 0.0013, one-way ANOVA with Tukey's post hoc testing). In addition, while the difference between isoproterenol and norepinephrine was not significant, the difference between isoproterenol and all other groups did reach significance. B, MMP-9 levels in cortical lysates from animals that were treated for 2 weeks with saline or VFX. VFX was associated with a significant increase in cortical MMP-9 (pg/μg total tissue, n = 4 or 5 mice per group, p = 0.044, Student's t test). *p < 0.05.