Figure 8.
Use of specific inhibitors to demonstrate the involvement of the NALP 3 inflammasome in IL-1β production: (a) THP-1 cells were pretreated with cathepsin B inhibitor, CA-074 methyl ester, at 10 μM for 45 min and then exposed to different aspect ratio CeO2 nanorods at 80 μg mL−1 for 5 h in complete RPMI 1640. There was associated with a statistically significant decrease in IL-1β production for S2, S4, S6 and S7. No statistical changes were found in S0. # denotes p < 0.05 compared to non-drug treated control cells; * statistically significant at p < 0.05 compared to CA-074 ME (+) cells; # p < 0.05 for pair-wise comparisons as shown. (b) Similar inhibition results are observed when using the endocytosis inhibitor, Cytochalasin D.