Figure 4
From: Functional polarization of human hepatoma HepaRG cells in response to forskolin

Formation of BC and hepatic marker mRNA expression in HepaRG cells exposed to various cAMP analogs. (a–c) HepaRG cells were either exposed to 0.1% (vol/vol) DMSO (control/CTR) or treated for 72 h by 50 µM FSK, 500 µM 8-Br-cAMP, 100 µM Sp-5,6-DCl-cBIMPS, 500 µM 6-Bnz-cAMP or 500 µM 8-pCPT-2-O-Me-cAMP. (a) Cells were then observed by phase contrast microscopy, allowing to distinguish refractive bright/white BC, indicated by white arrows on phase-contrast microscopic pictures; white bar = 50 µm. (b) BC numbers were next quantified by image analysis, as indicated in Methods. (c) mRNA expression of various hepatic markers was determined by RT-qPCR; data are expressed as fold change comparatively to untreated control cells. Data shown are representative of 4 independent experiments (a) or are the means ± SEM of at least 3 independent assays (b,c). (b,c) *p < 0.05 when compared to control cells.