Fig. 3

CircPRKCH activated the HGF/c-MET signaling pathway by targeting miR-145 in chondrocytes. A, B The binding sites between circPRKCH and miR-145, and miR-145 and HGF predicted by bioinformatics tools StarBase and Targetscan, respectively. C, D The luciferase activity of wild-type (WT-circPRKCH, WT-HGF) and mutant (MUT-circPRKCH, MUT-HGF) co-transfected with miR-145 mimics or mimics NC in chondrocytes. E Chondrocytes were transfected with sh-circPRKCH or sh-NC. RT-qPCR measured circPRKCH, miR-145, and HGF levels. F Chondrocytes were transfected with miR-145 mimics, miR-145 inhibitor, or negative controls. MiR-145 and HGF expression was detected by RT-qPCR. G, H Chondrocytes were treated with sh-circPRKCH, miR-145 mimics, or miR-145 inhibitor. Western blotting was used to test HGF, p-c-MET, and c-MET expression. Data are the means ± SD for three independent experiments. *p< 0.05, **p< 0.01, and ***p< 0.001