Fig. 1

Transferrin serum levels reflect the decreased transferrin expression in advanced liver disease. a, b Hepatic transferrin protein levels were determined by immunoblotting in cirrhotic patients (cirrhosis) and individuals without a significant liver disease (control). GAPDH was used as a loading control. The relative band intensity was quantified with the ImageJ software (cohort i). c Immunohistochemical staining of liver sections with an antibody against transferrin. Scale bar = 200 μm (cohort i). d Normalized transcripts per million base pairs (tpm) of the Transferrin gene in patients with alcohol-related liver disease and normal livers. The samples were obtained from biopsies from patients with normal background liver (“Normal,” N = 10), patients with early or silent alcohol-related steatohepatitis (“Early,” N = 12), and patients with alcoholic hepatitis (AH), at different disease stages: non-severe (NSev_AH, N = 11) and severe (Severe_AH, N = 27, including biopsies N = 18 and explants N = 9) (cohort ii). e Spearman’s correlation coefficient reveals the relationship between serum transferrin levels and relative hepatic transferrin mRNA expression in 23 patients with advanced liver disease and available matched serum-mRNA sample pairs (cohort i)