Fig 2: Immunohistochemical micrographs of cholesteatoma tissue and control group. (a) Few to moderate TIMP–2 positive cells in the matrix (*) and occasional in the perimatrix (*), TIMP–2 IHC, X 200; (b) Moderate to numerous TIMP–2 positive cells in the epithelium (*) and a few in the connective tissue (*) of a control skin sample, TIMP–2 IHC, X 200 [38].

Fig 3: Immunolocalization of MMP-2 (A) and TIMP2 (B) in aorta of rats in all groups. Red arrows indicate aortal intima. IHC A and B. Objective magn. ×40; bar 100 µm.

Fig 4: JQ1 treatment reverts the expression of some extracellular matrix (ECM) genes in aged muscle. (a) Snapshots of H3K27ac binding profiles on five selected ECM enhancers in 2-, 10-, and 20-month-old muscles. (b) Binding of H3K27ac and Brd4 (c) on selected ECM enhancers in the above muscles was measured by ChIP-PCR. (d) RNA expression levels of the above selected ECM genes were quantified by RT-qPCR. (e) Schematic overview of intraperitoneal injection of JQ1 and experimental design. (f) Down-regulation of ECM genes (Col1a1, Timp2) in skeletal muscle treated with JQ1. (g) Brd4 or H3K27ac (h) binding on the above two genes was measured by ChIP-PCR. The p-value was determined by Student's t test: *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001, ns, not significant

Fig 5: Effects of lutein/zeaxanthin on proliferation and MMP/TIMP system in ARPE-19 cells treated with H2O2. ARPE-19 cells were treated with H2O2, with or without lutein/zeaxanthin at the indicated concentrations for 24 h. Treatment with DMSO (0.02%, w/v) was set up as the negative control. (a) MTS assay for evaluation of cell viability. Data are expressed as mean ± SD, *P < 0.05 versus control, and **P < 0.01 versus control. (b) MTS assay for evaluation of cell viability. Data are expressed as mean ± SD, # P < 0.05 versus DMSO without H2O2, *P < 0.05 versus DMSO with H2O2, and **P < 0.01 versus DMSO with H2O2. (c) Western blot analysis for protein levels of MMP-2 and TIMP-2. ß-Actin was used as an invariant control for equal loading. Representative blots were from three independent experiments with quantification. Data are expressed as mean ± SD, # P < 0.05 versus DMSO without H2O2, *P < 0.05 versus DMSO with H2O2, and **P < 0.01 versus DMSO with H2O2.