Figure 7

Effect of the combined treatment on caspase-3 activation in the organs of aged septic rats. Rats were sham operated or subjected to CLP with injection of vehicle (normal saline) or GG-2 (80 nmol/kg of ghrelin and 50 µg/kg of GH) at 5 h after CLP. The tissues were harvested at 20 h after CLP for the protein extraction. Levels of cleaved caspase-3 in the (A) lung and (B) liver tissues were determined by Western blotting. Representative blots against cleaved caspase-3 and β-actin. Blots were scanned and quantified with densitometry. The levels of protein expression in sham group are designated 1 for comparison. Data are expressed as mean ± SE (n = 5–7 per group). *P < 0.05 versus sham and ^#P < 0.05 versus vehicle.