Research Paper Volume 13, Issue 1 pp 1017—1031

Figure 4. AIM2 inhibits Gli1 expression independent of SMO. (A) Western blots of Gli1 and SMO protein expression in SW480 and SW620 cells stably transfected with control-shRNA (NC) or shRNA against AIM2 (KD). GAPDH as a loading control. Each experiment was performed at least triplicate and the bands were quantified and presented as the mean±SEM. (B) Western blots of Gli1 and SMO protein expression in HCT116 and LoVo cells stably transfected with empty vector (VEC) or plasmid encoding human AIM2 (AIM2). GAPDH as a loading control. Each experiment was performed at least triplicate and the bands were quantified and presented as the mean±SEM. (C) Western blots of AIM2 and Gli1 protein expression in HCT116 cells treated with 20 ng/mL TGF-β for 48 h. (D) Representative images of IHC staining of AIM2 and Gli1 in subcutaneous tumors derived from HCT116 (VEC vs. AIM2) cells. (E) Western blots of AIM2 and Gli1 protein expression in subcutaneous tumors. N, nonsignificant, *P<0.05, **P<0.01, ***P<0.001, based on a two-tailed paired Student’s t-test.