Fig. 1

Induction of TFEB and CLEAR network genes in cells subjected to starvation. a ARPE-19 cells were subjected to 24–72 h period of nutrient deprivation and the expression levels of TFEB and MITF was measured by immunoblotting. b Expression of TFEB in RPE choroid extracts from mice subjected to 24–72 h period of nutrient withdrawal. c Quantitative real time PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis was performed to analyze the expression of autophagy and lysosomal genes: BECN1, CTSD, LAMP1, MCOLN1 and SGSH in ARPE-19 cells subjected to nutrient deprivation for 48 h. d LysoTracker staining of ARPE-19 cells in cells subjected to nutrient deprivation for 24 h. e ARPE-19 cells were subjected to a 24 h period of nutrient deprivation to determine the cellular expression of LC3 by immunostaining. f Immunostaining with p62 antibody to determine cellular levels of p62 in cells subjected to nutrient deprivation and Bafilomycin treatment for 24 h. g Immunoblot analysis to determine the expression of p62 in cells subjected to nutrient deprivation for 24 and 48 h. Values represent mean ± s.d. of three independent experiments. For animal experiments n = 3 mice were used per group. Student’s t-test (two tailed) was used. For quantification of images Mann–Whitney U test was used. *P-value <0.05 and **P-value <0.01. Scale = 20 μm