Fig. 4.

Effects of hesperetin on LXRα signal in THP-1 macrophages. THP-1 macrophages were treated with hesperetin (10 μmol/L, 50 μmol/L, 100 μmol/L) and/or T0901317 (10 μmol/L) for 24 h. Control cells were cultured for the same time without any treatments. Total proteins and RNAs were extracted and analyzed using western blot and real-time RT-PCR, respectively. (a and c) The effects of hesperetin on the levels of the LXRα protein and mRNA. (b and d) The best effective concentration of hesperetin of 100 μmol/L was used to further validate the hesperetin-induced activation of LXRα. (e–g) The effects of hesperetin on the levels of the ABCA1, ABCG1, and SR-BI proteins. The results are presented as the means ± SD from three independent experiments performed in triplicate. * p < 0.05 and ** p < 0.01 compared with control; Δ p < 0.05 and ΔΔ p < 0.01 compared with treatment with T0901317