Fig. 7

Cholesterol-induced ROS initiate apoptosis and autophagy in TDSCs through the AKT/FOXO1 pathway. a, b TDSCs were treated with cholesterol (10 mg/dL) for different periods of time. Levels of p-AKT, T-AKT, p-FOXO1, and FOXO1 were analyzed by western blotting. c, d TDSCs were pretreated with NAC (5 mM, 1 h) before incubation with 10 mg/dL cholesterol and NAC for 24 h. Levels of p-AKT, T-AKT, p-FOXO1, and FOXO1 were analyzed by western blotting. e–h TDSCs were pretreated with AS1842856 (10 μM, 1 h) before incubation with 10 mg/dL cholesterol and AS1842856 for 24 h. Levels of p-FOXO1, FOXO1, LC3-II, p62, cleaved caspase-3, Bax, Bcl-xL, and PARP were analyzed by western blotting. i Representative fluorescent images of TDSCs pretreated with or without NAC (5 mM, 1 h) and AS1842856 (10 μM, 1 h), incubated with cholesterol for 24 h and stained with FoxO1 antibody. FoxO1 proteins are shown in red, nuclei were stained with DAPI (in blue), and the bar is 50 μm. All quantitative data are expressed as the means ± SEM of the results from three independent experiments. *p < 0.05 versus control, ^#p < 0.05 versus CHO. CHO, cholesterol