Figure 5. Interaction of S. pneumoniae with endothelial cells does not cause serious disruption of the intercellular junctions in vitro.
Immunofluorescent detection of VE-Cadherin (red) and S. pneumoniae (green) in HBMEC in normal conditions and after 1 hour incubation with 106 CFU pneumococci. Cells were stained as described in Material and Methods. Panel A shows fluorescence microscope image 630X total magnification; panel B shows confocal microscope image; panels C and D show the YZ and XZ orthogonal view planes.