Fig. 2.

Kinetics of tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-α (ng/ml + s.e.m.) and interleukin (IL)-12 (pg/ml + s.e.m.) production in vitro in the presence of Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS) by peripheral blood mononuclear cells from healthy donors is shown. Cells were preactivated with 100 ng/ml E. coli LPS and spontaneous cytokine production (medium + LPS, n= 15 and n= 13) or in response to Echinococcus multilocularis metacestode culture supernatant (EmMed + LPS, n= 11) as well as viable vesicles (EmVes + LPS, n= 8) were quantified by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) after 24, 48, 72 and 96 h of incubation. Dunnett’s test was used for statistic analysis, and the data were stabilized by logarithmic transformation [log (pg/ml + 0·5)]. The level of significance was adjusted according to Bonferroni–Holm (16 tests; *α = 0·0031).