Figure 7
Enalapril decreases pathological cardiac hypertrophy in UUO/CKD mice. (A) Both systolic and diastolic BP were significantly elevated in the UUO-only mice compared to the Enalapril-treated UUO mice. The mean systolic BP was 144.92 mmHg and 125.96 mmHg in UUO/CKD and Enalapril-treated UUO/CKD mice, respectively. The mean diastolic BP was 124.78 mmHg and 106.27 mmHg in UUO/CKD and Enalapril-treated UUO/CKD mice, respectively. *P < 0.05 vs. Control, **P < 0.01 vs. Control, ###P < 0.001 vs. UUO. (B) The increase in cardiac mass as measured by the ratio of heart weight to body weight was significantly reduced in the Enalapril-treated UUO mice, relative to the UUO-only mice. *P < 0.05 vs. Control. #P < 0.05 vs. UUO. (C) Immunofluorescence staining of cardiac tissues with WGA-conjugated FITC. Decreased cell size was observed in the hearts of Enalapril-treated UUO mice by WGA staining. Bar = 100 μm. (D) Quantification of cardiomyocyte size was performed using ImageJ. Enalapril treatment alleviated the cardiomyocyte enlargement in UUO hearts. *P < 0.05 vs. Control. (E) The expressions of cardiac hypertrophy genes ANP and BNP were measured by qRT-PCR. There was significantly decreased expression of ANP and BNP in the Enalapril-treated UUO mice. Expression levels of individual genes were normalized to the expression level of β-actin. *P < 0.05 vs. Control, #P < 0.05 vs. UUO, ###P < 0.001 vs. UUO. Bar values represent means ± SEM (error bars). Statistical analyses were performed with t-tests. N = 6.
