L. acidophilus strain supplementation attenuates DSS-induced colitis and restores ILC3 frequency and IL-22 level in CS mice
(A) Schematic representation of L. acidophilus administration and experimental timeline, created with BioRender.
(B–G) Mice treated with L. acidophilus or PBS were given 3% DSS in drinking water for 8 days. Disease assessment was performed at day 8 by weight loss (B), DAI scores (C), colon shortening (D and E), H&E staining with histopathological scores of the distal colon (F and G), scale bars, 100 μm (n = 5 per group).
(H and I) qRT-PCR analysis of relative Il1b (H) and Tnf (I) expression in the colon tissue of mice from different groups treated with 3% DSS for 8 days (n = 6 per group).
(J–L) ELISA determined the protein levels of IL-1β (J), TNF-α (K), and IL-22 (L) in the colon tissue of mice from different groups treated with 3% DSS for 8 days (n = 6 per group).
(M–P) Representative flow cytometry plots and percentage of colonic ILC3s (M and O) and IL-22+ILC3s (N and P) from DSS colitis mice treated with L. acidophilus or PBS (n = 4 per group).
Data shown as the mean ± SEM. One dot represents one mouse. ∗p < 0.05, ∗∗p < 0.01, ∗∗∗p < 0.001, and ∗∗∗∗p < 0.0001. VD(PBS): VD mice treated with PBS and exposed to 3% DSS; CS(PBS): CS mice treated with PBS and exposed to 3% DSS; VD(L.A.): VD mice treated with L. acidophilus and exposed to 3% DSS; CS(L.A.): CS mice treated with L. acidophilus and exposed to 3% DSS.