Figure 7.

Gene expression of proinflammatory (a, b, c, and d) and T helper cell (e and f) cytokines in jejunum of chickens fed diets supplemented with carnosine during infection with E. maxima. Each box plot represented (from top to bottom) the maximum, upper quartile, medium, median, lower quartile, and minimum value. NC = basal diet, PC = basal diet for infected chickens, HCS = carnosine at 10.0 mg/kg feed, LCS = carnosine at 1.0 mg/kg feed. All chickens, except for NC were infected by oral gavage on d 14 with 1.0 × 10⁴ sporulated oocysts/chicken of E. maxima. P < 0.05 (*), P < 0.01 (**), and P < 0.001 (***) were significant. The data (n = 6) were collected on d 20 (6 d postinfection). Transcript levels of the cytokines were measured using quantitative RT-PCR and normalized to GAPDH transcript levels.