75 ml of Isogen (Nippon Gene Co. Ltd., Tokyo, Japan) and then mixed Wnt inhibitor thoroughly with 0.15 ml of chloroform. The mixture was centrifuged (20,000 × g for 5 min), and then the aqueous phases were collected,

and 0.4 ml of isopropanol was added. The precipitated total RNA was recovered and washed with 70% (v/v) ethanol. The purity and concentration of the total RNA thus obtained were confirmed using an Experion electrophoresis system (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc., California, USA) and a NanoDrop 1000 signaling pathway spectrophotometer (Thermo Fisher Scientific K. K., Massachusetts, USA). Construction of gene specific primers Gene specific primers were designed by using Primer-BLAST (http://​www.​ncbi.​nlm.​nih.​gov/​tools/​primer-blast/​). The primers used were as follows: for ATPGD1 (NM_134148), forward primer, 5′-CCCTGGCCTTCGACCTCTCTCCAT-3′ and reverse primer, 5′-CGGCACTGGGGCCCATCCTTC-3′ to yield a 164-bp product; for CN1 (NM_177450), forward primer, 5′-TGGTGGCATCCTCAACGAACCA-3′

and reverse primer, 5′-TCCAGGAATTAGGATGTGGCCTGA-3′ to yield an 88-bp product; for ß-actin (NM_007393), forward primer, 5′-ATGAGCTGCCTGACGGCCAGGTCATC-3′ and reverse primer, 5′-TGGTACCACCAGACAGCACTGTGTTG-3′ to yield a 192-bp product. Quantification of mRNA levels cDNA was synthesized by using a PrimeScript RT reagent Kit with gDNA Eraser (Takara Bio, Inc., Shiga, Japan). The genomic DNA in the RNAs extracted from tissues was eliminated with gDNA Eraser, which were then reverse-transcribed find more by PrimeScript RT. Each 25 μl of the PCR reaction mix contained a 2 μl template, 0.2 μM of each primer, and 1× ROX Reference Dye II in 1× SYBR Premix Ex Taq

II (Takara Bio, Inc.). The reaction was performed at 95°C for 30 s; this was followed by 40 cycles at 95°C for 5 s and at Cobimetinib chemical structure 60°C for 20 s. The fluorescence was measured at the end of the extension step in each cycle. Following cycling, a melt curve analysis was performed after each quantitative PCR to ensure that a single product had been amplified per primer set. The fold-change of the gene expression was calculated using the 2-∆∆Ct method with ß-actin as an internal control. Student’s t-test was used (P < 0.05 or P < 0.01) to test statistical significance. Detection of carnosine in muscle and blood Vastus lateralis muscle samples were deproteinized with 1 ml of 5% (w/v) sulfosalicylic acid. The samples were centrifuged at 20,000 × g for 5 min, and then the supernatants were filtered with a 0.45-μm filter. Blood samples were dissolved in 1 M perchloric acid (final concentration, 0.3 M) and centrifuged at 20,000 × g for 5 min. KOH (3 M) was added to the supernatants to realize a final concentration of 4.25% v/v. After centrifugation (20,000 × g for 5 min), the obtained supernatants were filtered and applied to a TSKgel ODS-80Ts column (Tosoh Co., Tokyo, Japan) equilibrated with 4% (v/v) acetonitrile, 100 mM sodium 1-pentanesulfonate, and 200 mM ammonium dihydrogen phosphate (pH 2.0).