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. 2011 Nov 17;3(4):e00068. doi: 10.1042/AN20110027

Figure 1. Maternal injections of LPS elicited an inflammatory response in the foetal forebrain.

Figure 1

(A) Cytokine levels were significantly increased in maternal serum 4 h after the first injection of LPS (200 μg/kg, intraperitoneally) Dams were injected at GD15 and GD16 and killed 4 h after the first (4 h) or the second LPS-injection (28 h). Results were plotted as the means±S.E.M. for five or six saline-injected dams and nine or ten LPS-injected dams per time point. *P<0.05 versus respective control (saline-injected dams), One-way ANOVA followed by Bonferroni's multiple comparison test. (B) Pro-inflammatory cytokine expression levels were increased in the foetal forebrain at different time-points after maternal injections of LPS. Cytokine expression levels were measured in the foetal cerebral cortex by qRT–PCR at GD15, 4 h after the first (4 h) maternal injection of LPS or saline; at GD16, 4 h after the second injection (28 h), and at GD18, 48 h after the second maternal injection of LPS or saline (72 h). At least three foetuses/dam/group/time-point were analysed. Levels were normalized to GAPDH. Histograms represent the means±S.E.M. of 9–30 foetuses from five or six saline-injected dams and eight to ten LPS-injected dams per time point. *P<0.05, **P<0.01 versus respective saline-exposed foetuses, One-way ANOVA followed by Bonferroni's multiple comparison test. (C–F) Dams received two consecutive injections of LPS (200 μg/kg, intraperitoneally) at GD15 and GD16 and were killed at GD18. (C) The microglial marker CD68 was strongly expressed in the LPS-exposed foetal forebrain at GD18. LV, lateral ventricle. Scale bar = 50 μm. (D) A significant increase in GFAP protein levels was found at GD18 in LPS-exposed foetal cerebral cortex. Values derived from the densitometric analysis were corrected for the background, normalized to β-actin and are shown as a percentage of the value for saline-exposed foetuses. The histogram shows represents the means±S.E.M. for 11–12 foetuses from seven saline-injected and seven LPS-injected dams. *P<0.05 versus saline-exposed foetuses, Student's t test. (E) GFAP immunoreactivity was mainly localized in the IZ in both LPS- and saline-exposed foetuses. Scale bar = 50 μm. (F) Higher magnification of the insets in (B) shows that GFAP-positive cells display a reactive phenotype in the IZ of LPS-exposed foetuses (arrow). Nuclei were identified by DAPI staining. Scale bar = 20 μm.