FIG 3.

Treatment of H9C2 cells with wortmannin significantly diminished the infectivity of parasites independently of pretreatment with ASA or celecoxib. Internalization indices were calculated for the interaction process between H9C2 cells pretreated for 1 h with ASA (2.5 mM) (a) or celecoxib (0.625 mM) (b) and exposed to T. cruzi (Y strain). Cells were treated or not with ASA or celecoxib for 1 h at 37°C in a 5% CO₂ atmosphere. After washing in PBS, the cells were incubated with medium (control) or wortmannin (200 nM) for 30 min at 37°C. An equivalent amount of the carrier (DMSO) was added to untreated cells. After washing in PBS, control and wortmannin-treated cells were incubated for 24 h with a parasite:cell ratio of 5:1. Values are the means ± standard errors of the means of three experiments. *, P < 0.001 (compared to infected cells cultured in medium alone); ns, not significant.