Figure 5.

Effect of BMP7 on the activation of signal proteins in response to proinflammatory cytokines treatment. Orbital fibroblasts from GO patients (n = 3) and normal control non-GO subjects (n = 3) were treated with IL-β or TNF-α (10 ng/mL for one hour) with or without pretreatment with 100 ng rhBMP7 for one hour. (A) Western blot analyses were conducted to compare protein expressions. Treatment with rhBMP7 attenuated IL-1β or TNF-α-induced expression of p-NFκB, p-Akt and p-Jnk in GO cells. Experiments were performed in three GO and three non-GO cells from different individuals. The representative gel images are shown. (B) Quantification of signal pathway proteins was performed using densitometry analysis. The relative band intensity of each protein was indicated by the ratio of phosphorylated protein and total protein and normalized to the level of β-actin in the same sample. The results are presented as the mean density ratio ± SD (*P < 0.05).