Fig. 8

a Representative images of autophgosome formation in RVECs detected by TEM in the three groups (The arrow heads indicated the double-membraned vacuoles digesting organelles or cytosolic contents, Bar = 500 μm). b Representative images of endogenous GFP-LC3B visualized by fluorescence microscopy either as a diffuse cytoplasmic pool or as punctate structures that primarily represent autophagosomes (Bar = 20 μm) (a) and statistical histogram of percentage of punctate GFP cells in different groups (b) (*P<0.05, **P<0.01). c Representative immunoblot bands of LC3B-I, LC3B-II in RVECs in the three groups (a). The histograms were the quantification of 3 independent experiments on LC3B (b). The levels of these proteins were normalized to that of GAPDH (** P<0.01)