Figure 8.

Decorin induces depolarization in ex vivo aortic ring assays in 3D collagen I and in vascular endothelial cells. A: serialized aortic rings treated overnight with the indicated concentrations of decorin followed by tetramethyl rhodamine ethyl ester (TMRE) staining (150 nM). Live bright field images were acquired to demonstrate the presence of sprouts from the aortic rings. All images were captured with a 200-ms exposure at ×10 magnification. Bar ∼ 90 µm. B: quantification of the TMRE signal from A. C: live cell images of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) treated with decorin (6 h, 200 nM) and stained with JC-1. D: quantification of the resultant TMRE signal in HUVEC following decorin or CCCP (1 µM). PBS served as control vehicle for all experiments. All data presented are reflective of several (n = 4, unless otherwise indicated here or in the text) independent biological replicates. Data are expressed as means ± SE. Statistics calculated via one-way ANOVA (***P < 0.001).