Figure 1.

Resveratrol inhibited AGEs-induced expression of iNOS and COX-2 and production of NO and PGE₂. Chondrocytes 1 × 10⁶/ml were pretreated with various doses of resveratrol or the solvent (V), ethanol, for 24 h and then stimulated with 100 μg/ml AGEs for another 24 h. The expressions of iNOS and COX-2 and β-actin proteins were determined by Western blot (a). The productions of NO and PGE₂ in the culture supernatants were measured by Griess reactions or ELISA as described in Materials and Methods (b and c). Chondrocytes treated with various concentrations of resveratrol for 48 h were collected and MTT assays were performed to determine possible drug cytotoxicity (d). The values shown in each Western blot represented fold inductions of the densitometric intensity compared to the un-stimulated sample after normalization to internal β-actin density. The representative data out of three independent experiments are shown. *: P < 0.05.