Results Contractile response of vascular ring to NA Vascular dysfunction is related to increased vasoconstriction and

weakened diastolic function. Therefore, we are interested in determining whether there is any change in the vascular function by detecting the vascular reactivity of aortic rings S3I-201 to a physiological modulator, noradrenaline (NA). Cumulatively added NA (10-10-10-5M) caused concentration-dependent contractile responses in isolated aortic rings. We found that there was no significant difference between the SE and the CS group, while the ES group significantly increased the vasoconstrictive response to NA (P<0.01), LBPs treatment decreased the vasoconstrictive effect ( P< 0.01) (Figure 1). Furthermore, the contractile responsiveness to NA of the SE group was significantly lower than that of the ES (P<0.01) and ES-LBP (P<0.01) groups (Figure 1). Figure 1 Contractile response of vascular ring to NA. Dose-dependence of NA on contraction of the thoracic aorta rings separated from rats in CS SE, ES and ES-LBP groups. The contraction induced by 60

mM KCl was taken as 100%. Data are expressed as mean ± SD (n=10). # P<0.01 vs CS; ※ P<0.01vs SE; JQ1 △ P<0.01 vs ES. Effects of LBPs on body weight and exhaustive exercise time in rats After four weeks of swimming exercise, no significant difference was observed in body weight in either group (Table 2). However, as shown in Figure 2, LBPs prolonged the swimming time of rats compared with the ES group ( P ROS1 < 0.05), which was 77.07% higher. Table 2 Effects of LBP on body weight in rats Group Before experiment One week Two week Three week Four week CS 191.67±26.90 204.83±13.43 264.08±12.31 304.44±9.97 346.58±15.55 SE 187.5±4.74 209.53±6.15 258.43±9.88 309.35±19.11 340.5±22.31 ES 191.2±10.77 210.67±10.91 263.5±14.05 304.58±17.12 329.13±15.06 ES-LBP 198.2±9.66 215.14±7.22 267.70±6.96 312.08±10.14 344.33±14.91

Effects of LBPs on body weight in rats. The values are expressed as mean ± SD (n=10). Figure 2 Effects of LBPs on exhaustive exercise time in the rats. LBPs supplementation significantly increased the time to fatigue compared to that of the ES. Data are mean ± SD (n =10). △ P < 0.01 vs ES. Effects of LBPs on biochemical parameters after exhaustive exercise It is well known that SOD can inhibit the oxidation of oxyamine by the xanthine–xanthine oxidase system. Therefore we evaluated the plasmic level of SOD. As shown in Figure 3a, the SOD level in the ES-LBP, SE groups significantly increased compared with that in the CS group (P<0.05 and P<0.01 respectively). However, the plasmic SOD level of exhaustive swimming rats was significantly lower than that of the ES-LBP and SE rats (P< 0.01). The results demonstrated that LBPs were able to increase antioxidant enzyme activities to attenuate the oxidative stress induced by exhaustive exercise. Figure 3 Effects of LBPs supplement and exhaustive exercise on SOD (a), MDA (b), NO (c) and HSP70 (d) expression in the rats.