Fig 3.

Effect of IL-22-deficient CD4⁺ T cells as donor cells on pGP3-deficient C. muridarum spreading from small intestine into large intestine in Rag2^−/− mice. Mice deficient in Rag2 (Rag2^−/−) listed on the right as recipient mice were adoptively transferred without (panel a, n = 5) or with 1 × 10⁶ donor CD4⁺ T cells purified from C57BL/6J (b, n = 5) or IL-22^−/− (c, n = 4) mice. The transfer was performed via retro-orbital injection twice, 3 days before and 1 day after infection, respectively. Mice were infected via intrajejunal injection with 1 × 10⁵ IFUs of CMpGP3S. Three days after inoculation, rectal swabs (Swb) were collected, and all mice were sacrificed for collecting gastrointestinal tissues as listed along the X-axis. Live CMpGP3S organisms were recovered from each sample and expressed as log₁₀ IFUs per tissue or swab. The data came from two or three independent experiments. Note that IL-22-deficient CD4⁺ T cells were insufficient for rescuing Rag2^−/− mice to block the spreading of live chlamydial organisms into the large intestine. * denotes an observed P-value <0.05, based on a Wilcoxon rank-sum test, comparison of the live chlamydial organisms in the colon and large intestinal tissues overall between panels b and c.