Kidneys were collected at 7 days after various treatments (A). TKPT were serum starved for 24 hours and then treated with PCI34051 (PCI) at 6.26 μM for 1 hour (D) or transfected with HDAC8 siRNA or scrambled siRNA for 24 hours (G) followed by exposure of cells to TGFβ1 (5 ng/ml) for an additional 24 hours. Kidney (A-C) and cell lysates (D-F, G-I) were subjected to immunoblot analysis with antibodies against phosphorylated STAT3 (p-STAT3), STAT3, β-catenin, p-β-catenin, Tubulin and GAPDH (A, D, G). Expression levels of all those proteins were quantified by densitometry and normalized with Tubulin (B-C, E-F), or GAPDH (H, I). Values are the means ± S.D (n = 6). Bars with different letters (a–c) are significantly different from one another (P < 0.05).