Fig. 3

Cell proliferation activity and anti-fibrosis efficiency of HSA-bFGF NPs in vitro. (A) CCK-8 assay of HDFs for cell proliferation analysis. (B) Cell counting assay of HDFs for measuring number of viable cells. (C) BrdU assay of HDFs for DNA synthesis analysis. (D) Relative mRNA expression of myofibroblast-related genes represented as α-SMA, TGFβ-1, and TGFβ-2. (E, G, I) Immunocytochemical analysis of fibrosis marker proteins. Nuclei were represented as blue, and fibrosis marker proteins, α-SMA (E), TGFβ-1 (G), and TGFβ-2 (I), were shown as green, respectively. Scale bars, 200 μm. (F, H, J) Quantified fluorescence intensity of fibrosis marker proteins, respectively. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01 and *** p < 0.001, compared to HSA NP as a control. n = 3