Fig. 4

XFBD and its active compounds inhibited macrophage activation in vitro. (a) Scheme of macrophage activation and analysis. (b) XFBD extracts of 6.25–100 μg·mL^–1 inhibited IL-6 release on the macrophage-activation model in a dose-dependent manner after 24 h of treatment (n = 3, ***: P < 0.001 vs P2P). (c) Protein level of IL-6 in macrophage cells with treatment with different compounds (n = 3, **: P < 0.01, ***: P < 0.001 vs P2P). DEX was used as the positive control. The detailed concentrations of each treatment are listed in the Section 2.9. (d) The effects on IL-6 release of representative XFBD compounds with different doses in the P2P-stimulated macrophage model. The relative IL-6 concentrations were calculated by comparing the value of each compound-treated group with those of the model group. (e, f) Effect of isoliquiritin (50 μmol·L^–1) on the phosphorylation of JNK (p-JNK), p38 (p-p38), and MEK (p-MEK). Representative western blots are shown in (e) and statistical graphs are shown in (f) (n = 3; *: P < 0.05 vs P2P; #: P < 0.05, ##: P < 0.01 vs control). CTR: control.