Fig. 3

Etomidate increased the muscular tension and the level of the calpain-2 protein in rats in vivo. (A) Muscular tension monitoring in the etomidate, propofol, lidocaine plus etomidate group. (B) Western blot analysis for calpain-2 protein of neocortex and hippocampus in the etomidate, propofol, lidocaine plus etomidate group. (C) Quantification of blot after normalization to α-tubulin of calpain-2 in the etomidate, propofol, lidocaine plus etomidate group. Spearman correlation analysis of the relationship between the peak muscular tension amplitude and relative expression of calpain-2 to α-tubulin in neocortex (r = 0.7779, p = 0.0001, D) and hippocampus (r = 0.1188, p = 0.6387, F) and the relationship between the peak muscular tension frequency and relative expression of calpain-2 to α-tubulin in neocortex (r = 0.8039, p < 0.0001, E) and hippocampus (r = 0.2239, p = 0.3717, G). *: p < 0.05, **: p < 0.01 by one-way multiple comparison ANOVA test