SMAD3 and renal fibrosis: Cheng et al. revealed the pretreatment of Leonurine before ureteral obstruction repealed the expression of fibronectin, down-regulated the expression of vimentin, α-SMA, and type I/III collagen, TGF-β, TNF-α, IL-6 and IL-1β, Smad3, which revealed that Leonurine might be a renoprotective candidate for renal-fibrosis via effecting the NF-κB pathway and TGF-β/Smad3 pathway (Cheng et al., 2015).