FIG. 5.

Cytokine production by pDCs in response to HIV-1-derived ssRNA oligonucleotides and control ligands 3M011 and 3M002. Flow plots show PBMC gated on CD3^neg CD14^neg CD123^bright pDCs stained intracellularly for IFN-α (A) and TNF-α (C). HIV-1-derived ssRNA oligonucleotides (U-Variants) induced strong IFN-α and TNF-α production, whereas the control U-to-A sequences (A-Variants) and DOTAP alone induced responses similar to the background activity of unstimulated controls (neg). The graphs show the mean percentages ± standard deviations of IFN-α⁺ (B) and TNF-α⁺ (D) pDCs for all tested sequences. Data represent the results from four independent experiments.