Figure 1.

TNF-α is up-regulated in OA cartilage. Figure 1: TNF-α expression in cartilage (A). Cartilage was harvested from patients with upper limb amputation due to trauma and without osteoarthritis were diagnosed and OA patients and cultured in vitro. TNF-α expression in cartilage samples from normal (n = 13) and OA knee (n = 37) patients was assayed by qRT-PCR and normalized to 18 s. Bars represent the mean. ∗P < .05, Mann–Whitney U test. Total RNA was isolated for quantitative RT-PCR using TNF-α primers (B), Used β-actin as internal control. Total protein was harvested for western blot analysis using TNF-α antibody (C, D) β-actin was used as an internal control. The relative protein expression level of TNF-α was normalized to β-actin. The TNF-α level was measured in cartilage from non-arthritic donors and OA patients using ELISA (E). Data are shown as the means ± SD. ∗P < .05, OA Cartilage vs. normal Cartilage, the data were obtained from 37 OA patients receiving knee replacement surgery and 13 samples of non-arthritic tissues obtained during amputation.