Fig. 5

TCG promoted chondrocyte survival in vitro. A–G PMCs were treated with the indicated doses of TCG for 24 h. CCK8 assay (A) and EdU staining (B, C) was performed to assess the proliferation of PMCs (Scale bar = 100 µm); Flow cytometry (D, E) was used to detect the apoptotic rate of PMCs; RT-PCR (F, G) was employed to measure the transcriptional levels of ECM-related genes. H, I PMCs were treated with or without 10 µM TCG for 48 h, and RNA-sequence was conducted (n = 3 cells from 3 mice). Bubble chart showed the KEGG (H) and GO (I) analysis of differentially expressed genes. J, L PMCs were treated with 1 µM TCG under normoxic or hypoxic conditions for 24 h. RT-PCR was performed to assess the transcriptional levels of Hif1α and glycolysis-related genes under normoxic (J) and hypoxic (K) conditions, and western blot measured the protein expression of HIF1α and glycolytic enzymes (L). The relative protein expression statistics were presented in Additional file 1: Fig. S5A, B. Data were presented as mean ± SD (n = 3). *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.01