Schistosoma japonicum egg antigen up-regulates fibrogenesis and inhibits proliferation in primary hepatic stellate cells in a concentration-dependent manner

Figure 4 Western blotting (A, B) and real-time polymerase chain reaction (C) of α-smooth muscle actin, matrix metalloproteinase-9 and tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases-1 induced by Schistosoma japonicum egg antigen in primary hepatic stellate cells. A: Western blotting of α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA), matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMOL/LP-9) and tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases-1 (TIMP-1), and representatives of 3 independent experiments; B: The histograms reported as ratio of respective target gray scale to that of β-actin. C: The histograms represented the fold change of target genes normalized to glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase levels and quantified of 3 independent experiments. ^aP < 0.05 vs 0 μg/mL.