Fig. 5.

Cholesterol loading increases the phagocytotic activity of SMCs. (A) Subconfluent mouse SMCs were treated with (Chol) or without (Control) Chol:MβCD (10 μg/ml) in 0.2% BSA (72 h), followed by incubation with 1-μm latex beads (green) for 20 h. Cells were then washed extensively, fixed, counterstained with 4′,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (blue, for nuclei) and 1,1′-dioctadecyl-3,3,3′,3′-tetramethylindocarbocyanine (red, for cell membrane), and subjected to fluorescent microscopy. (Magnification, ×200.) (B) The number of cells and latex beads were also counted to obtain numerical data for phagocytotic activity. All data are averages ± SEM from independent duplicates.