Figure 7.

Western analysis of frontal cortex COX-2 abundance in adult male rats exposed to either the Phyto-600 or Phyto-free diets. A. Densiometric analysis of COX-2 frontal cortex Western autoradiograms. B. Abundance of cytochromeoxidase subunit 4 served as controls (for loading). C. Histogram of COX-2 abundance by treatment. For each immunoblot, the cytochromeoxidase band was divided into the COX-2 band within each lane, then the lowest intensity band was assigned an arbitrary number (1) and all other bands were expressed as a fraction of this value. The immunoblots analyzed represent the Mean ± SEM, averaging the band values from 4 to 6 independent blots). ^* COX-2 levels are significantly decreased in Phyto-free males compared to Phyto-600 male values. Note: Due to the relatively low abundance of phytoestrogens in the hippocampus, and the ability to detect COX-2 via Western analysis this was not preformed in this brain tissue site.