Hyaluronic acid ameliorates the proliferative ability of human amniotic epithelial cells through activation of TGF-β/BMP signaling

This study investigated the mechanism by which 300 kDa HA (1 mg/mL) promotes the proliferation of hAECs. P1 hAECs in logarithmic growth phase were harvested, inoculated into 6-well plates at 3×105/well, and cultured with 5% CO2 at 37 °C. The medium was changed after 3 days, and then the cells were cultured for 18 or 36 h in the presence and absence of HA (300 kDa, 1 mg/mL). The total RNA was purified using the RNeasy MinElute kit (Qiagen, Valencia, CA, USA) according to the manufacturer’s instructions. cDNA was synthesized using a SuperScript III Reverse Transcriptase Kit (Invitrogen, Shanghai, China). Real-time PCR was conducted, and the 2–∆∆Ct method was used to quantify gene expression levels. The signal was collected by Agilent Feature Extraction software and analyzed by Agilent GeneSpring GX software. qPCR gene expression profiling. hAECs from three samples were used and treated separately as indicated in the summary. Equal amount total RNA from each donor was pooled prior to gene expression analysis.