Fig. 5

Assessment of proliferation and TGFβ signaling in smooth muscle cells following the manipulation of A2M expression and human decidua basalis. a, a1–a4 Western blotting data showing the expression of A2M, p-Smad2/3, TGFβ1, and PCNA in HUASMCs transfected with negative control, A2M-overexpresion, or A2M-silencing vectors (a), and a1–a4 shows the quantitative analysis of A2M (a1), p-Smad2/3 (a2), TGFβ1 (a3), and PCNA (a4) in the control, A2M-overexpression and A2M-downregulated groups. b, b1–b4 Western blotting data showing the expression of A2M, p-Smad2/3, TGFβ1, and PCNA in HUASMCs transfected with negative control, treat with TGFβ1 and A2M-silenced + treated with TGFβ1 (b), and b1–b4 show the quantitative analysis of A2M (b1), p-Smad2/3 (b2), TGFβ1 (b3), and PCNA (b4) expressions among the control, treatment with TGFβ1 and A2M-silenced + treated with TGFβ1 groups. c Western blotting data showing the expression of TGFβ1 and the quantitative analysis of TGFβ1 expression in human decidua basalis of the third trimester from the normal and PE groups. d Schematic illustration of A2M overexpression leading to cell proliferation through the TGFβ signaling pathway. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.001