Fig. 5

Lycopene supplementation attenuated the inflammation of aortic sinus in HFD-fed ApoE^−/− mice. ApoE^−/− mice were fed a low-fat diet, a high-fat diet supplemented with or without 0.1% lycopene (w/w) for 19 weeks. (A, B) Immunohistochemical results of TLR4 and p-NF-κB P65 protein expression in the aortic sinus were presented graphically (40×magnification), as described in Materials and Methods. The browner the color, the higher the protein expression. (C, D) The protein expression levels of aortic TLR4, p-NF-ĸBp65 and NF-ĸBp65 were determined by Western blotting. Results are representative of three independent experiments. It was analyzed by Image J software. Expression values were normalized to housekeeping gene GAPDH, and expression in the control group was set to 1. Data are presented as the mean ± SD (n = 8 per group); ^ap < 0.05 compared with the control group; ^bp < 0.05 compared with the high-fat diet group. HFD, high-fat diet; LY, lycopene