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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2015 Apr 9.
Published in final edited form as: Small. 2013 Dec 10;10(7):1250–1254. doi: 10.1002/smll.201302887

Figure 3.

Figure 3

Binding force measurements between toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) and polyamino acids in DC2.4 dendritic cells. (a) An illuminated image of binding force measurements. Scale bar: 20 μm. (b) Force curves obtained in TLR4+/+ cells (1) and TLR4−/− cells (2) using an AFM tip modified with polyarginine. The arrowhead indicates the specific binding force between polyarginine and TLR4. (c) Histogram of the binding forces between polyarginine and TLR4 in TLR4+/+ DC2.4 cells. The bars represent the experimental data, while the solid line is the theoretical Gaussian distribution curve. (d) The binding probability of polyarginine, polylysine, polyhistidine or lipopolysacharide (LPS) to TLR4 in TLR4+/+ or TLR4−/− cells. Data is expressed as mean ± SD. Statistical significance was measured by comparing data obtained with the modified AFM tip to data obtained using an unmodified tip. **P < 0.01.