Figure 2.

CoQ₀ inhibits NLRP3 inflammasome activation in LPS/ATP-stimulated RAW264.7 macrophages. Cells were first treated with CoQ₀ (2.5-10 μM) and later stimulated with LPS (1 μg/mL) for 5 h followed by ATP (5 mM) treatment for 1 h. (a) The expression of NLRP3 and procaspase-1 protein was determined by Western blotting. (b) Caspase-1 activity was measured using a caspase-1 activity assay kit. (c) Pro-IL1β expressions in both lysis and supernatant and mature-IL1β in the supernatant were determined by Western blot using β-actin as internal control as well as band intensities were calculated by AlphaEaseFCTM (Genetic Technologies, Inc., Florida, USA) software. The data were calculated from the mean ± standard deviation (SD) of three independent experiments and ^∗∗∗p < 0.001, compared with untreated control cells, and ^###p < 0.001 compared with LPS/ATP-stimulated cells which was significant.