Hypoxic preconditioning restores the regenerative potential of aged adipose tissue derived mesenchymal stem cells

Figure 9 Normalized gene expression in young, aged normoxic, and hypoxia-hypoxic aged adipose tissue derived mesenchymal stem cells. A-J: Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction analysis of protein kinase B (A), sirtuin 1 (B), vascular endothelial growth factor (C), stromal cell-derived factor-1 (D), and insulin-like growth factor 1 (E) revealed significantly higher expression in young adipose tissue derived mesenchymal stem cells (ADMSCs) compared to aged normoxic ADMSCs, whereas hypoxia-preconditioning partially restored their expression. Conversely, senescence- and apoptosis-associated genes, including BAX (F), BAK1 (G), P53 (H), P21 (I), and P16 (J), were markedly upregulated in aged normoxic ADMSCs but were downregulated upon hypoxia preconditioning. Data were normalized to GAPDH expression (ΔCt) and are presented as mean ± SD. ^aP < 0.05; ^bP < 0.01; ^cP < 0.001; ^dP < 0.0001. AKT1: Protein kinase B; SIRT1: Sirtuin 1; VEGF: Vascular endothelial growth factor; SDF1: Stromal cell-derived factor-1; IGF1: Insulin-like growth factor 1.