3.7. RHC/EGF accelerates cell proliferation in wound skin
In full-thickness skin defect model, the cell proliferation activity in the wound can directly reflect the rate of wound healing and regenerative capacity. Ki67 and PCNA, as nuclear antigens related to proliferating cells, are important biomarker proteins for measuring cell proliferative activity. By detecting changes in its expression level, it can directly reflect the proliferation level of cells in the damaged skin. At 3 and 14 d, damaged skin tissues were collected to detect expression of two cell proliferation-specific proteins, Ki67(Brown & Gatter, 2002) and PCNA(Boehm, Gildenberg, & Washington, 2016), as shown in Fig. 5. After treatment for 3 d, expression of Ki67 and PCNA were significantly upregulated in the RHC/EGF group (Fig. 5A and C). Statistical results show that there is a significant difference between the RHC/EGF group and the Control group. This shows that RHC/EGF can accelerate wound healing by promoting cell proliferation in wound skin (Fig. 5 B and D); As the wounds healed, their expression was downregulated in all groups at 14 d.