Fig. 5.

Dysregulation of autophagy-related proteins in response to lipid oversupply. (A) Representative gels of western blot analysis of mTOR, phospho-ULK1 (p-ULK1; Ser757), ULK1, LC3-I/II, SIRT1 and MFN2 in liver homogenates from the six groups studied (n=3-6 per group). α-tubulin or β-actin was used as a loading control. (B) Histograms showing the protein/α-tubulin or β-actin, p-ULK1/ULK1 and LC3-II/LC3-I ratio quantification of band intensities in WT STD (n=3-4), Apoe^−/− STD (n=3-4) and Apoe^−/− HFD (n=4-6) mice after 8 or 18 weeks on the diet. Results are expressed as mean±s.e.m. Statistical significance was assessed by two-tailed unpaired Student's t-test, with the exception of p-ULK1/ULK1 18-week and mTOR and SIRT1 8- and 18-week data, which were evaluated by unpaired non-parametric Mann–Whitney U test. *P<0.05, **P<0.01 and ***P<0.001 versus WT STD mice; ^$P<0.05, ^$$P<0.01 and ^$$$P<0.001 versus Apoe^−/− STD mice.