NDRG1 and urinary bladder carcinoma: To investigate whether rhGDF15 treatment induced expressions of maspin and NDRG1 in bladder carcinoma cells via the TGFβ/Smad pathways, HT1376 cells were pretreated for 1 h with SB431542 or LY364947, TGF receptor kinase inhibitors, before being exposed to rhGDF15.