1. MicroRNA-21 Negatively Regulates Treg Cells Through a TGF-β1/Smad-Independent Pathway in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease
Cell Physiol Biochem 2015;37: DOI: /
Fig. 1. Flow cytometric analysis of circulating Treg cell frequencies in patients with CHD and CPS. PBM-Cs isolated from patients were labeled with CD4-FITC, CD25-APC and foxp3-PE antibodies. Cells were gated for CD4+T cells, after which the cells were gated for CD4+CD25+T cells and CD4+CD25+foxp3+T cells from samples obtained from AMI, UA, SA and CPS patients. The percentages of CD4+CD25+T cells and CD4+CD25+foxp3+T cell subsets in each group are shown in the panels. CHD: coronary heart disease (includes AMI, UA and SA); AMI: acute myocardial infarction; UA: unstable angina; SA: stable angina; CPS: chest pain syndrome; Treg cells: CD4+CD25+foxp3+T cells.
© 2015 S. Karger AG, Basel - CC BY-NC 3.0

2. MicroRNA-21 Negatively Regulates Treg Cells Through a TGF-β1/Smad-Independent Pathway in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease
Cell Physiol Biochem 2015;37: DOI: /
Fig. 2. Expression levels of miR-21, foxp3, TGF-β1 and smad7 in PBMCs and the levels of TGF-β1 in serum samples from patients with CHD and CPS. Levels of miR-21 (A), foxp3 (B), TGF-β1 (C) and smad7 (D) in PBMCs were analyzed by qRT-PCR, and serum TGF-β1 levels (E) were measured by ELISA. *P<0.05 vs. CPS; #P<0.01 vs. SA. CHD: coronary heart disease (includes AMI, UA and SA); AMI: acute myocardial infarction; UA: unstable angina; SA: stable angina; CPS: chest pain syndrome.
© 2015 S. Karger AG, Basel - CC BY-NC 3.0

3. MicroRNA-21 Negatively Regulates Treg Cells Through a TGF-β1/Smad-Independent Pathway in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease
Cell Physiol Biochem 2015;37: DOI: /
Fig. 3. Up-regulation of miR-21 results in decreased Treg cell frequency. PBMCs were transfected with miR-21 NS-m or miR-21-m. Cells were collected and then analyzed by flow cytometry. (A) and (C) show no significant differences between the frequencies of CD4+CD25+ T lymphocytes among the three groups; (B) and (D) show that the Treg cell frequency in the group transfected with miR-21 mimic significantly decreases compared with those of the other two groups. Treg cells: CD4+CD25+Foxp3+T cells. *p<0.01 vs. NS-m and blank.
© 2015 S. Karger AG, Basel - CC BY-NC 3.0

4. MicroRNA-21 Negatively Regulates Treg Cells Through a TGF-β1/Smad-Independent Pathway in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease
Cell Physiol Biochem 2015;37: DOI: /
Fig. 4. Down-regulation of miR-21 results in increased Treg cell frequency. PBMCs were transfected with miR-21-NS-i or miR-21-i. Cells were collected and then analyzed by flow cytometry. (A) and (C) show no significant differences between the frequencies of CD4+CD25+ T lymphocytes among the three groups; (B) and (D) show that the Treg cell frequency in cells transfected with miR-21-i increased compared with that of the other two groups. Treg cells: CD4+CD25+foxp3+T cells. *p<0.05 vs. NS-i and blank.
© 2015 S. Karger AG, Basel - CC BY-NC 3.0

5. MicroRNA-21 Negatively Regulates Treg Cells Through a TGF-β1/Smad-Independent Pathway in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease
Cell Physiol Biochem 2015;37: DOI: /
Fig. 5. Up-regulation of miR-21 results in decreased expression levels of foxp3, TGF-β1 and smad7 in PBMCs and decreased serum TGF-β1 levels in the cell culture supernatants. Cells transfected with miR-21 NS-m or miR-21-m and blank were collected and subjected to qRT-PCR analysis to examine the expression levels of miR-21 (A), foxp3 (B), TGF-β1 (C) and smad7 (D). We also used cell culture supernatants to measure the level of TGF-β1 (E) by ELISA. *P<0.05 vs. NS-m and blank.
© 2015 S. Karger AG, Basel - CC BY-NC 3.0

6. MicroRNA-21 Negatively Regulates Treg Cells Through a TGF-β1/Smad-Independent Pathway in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease
Cell Physiol Biochem 2015;37: DOI: /
Fig. 6. Down-regulation of miR-21 increases the expression levels of foxp3, TGF-β1 and smad7 in PBMCs and increases the level of TGF-β1 in the cell culture supernatants. Cells transfected with miR-21-NS-i or miR-21-i and blank were collected for qRT-PCR analysis and examined to determine the expression levels of miR-21 (A), foxp3(B), TGF-β1 (C) and smad7 (D). We also used cell culture supernatants to measure the level of TGF-β1 (E) by ELISA. *P<0.05 vs.NS-i and blank.
© 2015 S. Karger AG, Basel - CC BY-NC 3.0