Fig. 9

Endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress was involved in the neuroprotective effect of acupuncture against apoptosis in cerebral ischemia–reperfusion (I/R) injury. Experiments were performed at 72 h after the reperfusion in the ipsilateral brain tissues. a The apoptosis in brain tissues was evaluated by TUNEL assay. Scale bars, 50 μm. b The protein levels of Bcl-2 Associated X Protein (Bax), B-cell lymphoma-2 (Bcl-2), cleaved caspase-12, cleaved caspase-9, cleaved caspase-3, and cleaved poly ADP-ribose polymerase (PARP) in brain tissues were detected by Western blotting assay. β-actin was used as an internal control. c, d The relative abundance of the protein bands was calculated and shown. Results represent at least three independent experiments. Each experimental result was presented as mean ± standard deviation (n = 6). ^#P < 0.05, ^##P < 0.01, ^###P < 0.001 versus the indicated group