Fig. 5

Effect of sPIF on endometrial TIMP mRNA expression and MMP activities. Human ESCs were cultured in DMEM/F12 medium supplemented with E2, P4 and (in some experiments) 50 nM sPIF for 15 days. A Activities of gelatinases (MMP-9 and MMP-2) in CM from decidualized ESCs having been exposed for 15 days in presence or absence of sPIF (50 nM), as described in the Materials and Methods. This figure shows one representative of 11 separate experiments. B Quantification of gelatin zymography results for MMP-2 and MMP-9 activities. The data are presented as the mean ± SEM of 5 to 8 separate experiments. C Total RNA was extracted after 15 days of cell differentiation. mRNA expression levels of TIMP-1 and TIMP-2 were quantified by RT-qPCR, as described in the Materials and Methods. The data are presented as the mean ± SEM of 11 separate experiments. **: P < 0.005 (Wilcoxon test) for sPIF vs. the control (lacking sPIF)