The Risk of Heart Failure and Cardiometabolic Complications in Obesity May Be Masked by an Apparent Healthy Status of Normal Blood Glucose

Figure 5

Effects of hemin on the expression of important proteins of the insulin signal transduction pathway such as IRS-1, PI3K, GLUT4, and the expression of profibrotic/extracellular matrix proteins including collagen IV, TGF-𝛽, and fibronectin in left-ventricular tissue from ZLs and ZFs. Representative Western immunoblotting and relative densitometry of the expressed proteins normalized by G6PHD indicates that hemin therapy significantly (a) enhanced IRS-1, (b) increased PI3K, (c) upregulated GLUT4, but (d) abated collagen IV, (e) reduced TGF-𝛽, and (f) suppressed fibronectin in ZFs. Bars represent means ± SEM; 𝑛=4 rats per group (*𝑃<0.01 versus all groups; ^#𝑃<0.01 versus all groups).

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