Research Paper Volume 16, Issue 11 pp 9933—9943

Figure 4. Rg3 or miR-216a-5p inhibition alleviates kidney injury, prevents apoptosis, and induces MAPK pathway in kidney tissues of diabetic model mice. And we first fed mice with STZ to build a mouse diabetes model, and then treated by oral gavage of the 20 mg/kg Rg3 for 8 weeks or injected with miR-216a-5p inhibitors through a tail vein (once a day for 3 days). (A) qRT-PCR was adopted to assess the change of miR-216a-5p in the mice kidney tissues. (B) H&E staining indicated the pathological change of kidney tissues (Magnification, 200×). (C) TUNEL staining for the confirmation of cell apoptosis (Magnification, 200×). (D) Western blot was applied to analyze the expression changes of apoptosis-related proteins. (E) Western blot showed the changes of p-p70s6k, p70s6k, p-MAPK, and MAPK expressions. (F) Fasting blood glucose. (G) Blood urea nitrogen and creatinine. ^***P < 0.001 vs. control group; ^&&P < 0.01, ^&&&P < 0.001 vs. DKD group.