Figure 8.

TECK promotes Treg differentiation and function and accelerates the growth of endometriotic lesions in mice. Endometriosis-like lesions were induced in C57B/L6 mice by transplanting uterine tissues samples. The mice were treated with anti-mouse TECK neutralizing Abs (α-TECK) (50 μg/mice) (a–d), anti-mouse IL-10 neutralizing Abs (50 μg/mouse) or TGF-β receptor antagonist SB431542 (10 μM/mouse) (e, f) by intraperitoneal injection every week after surgery. Vehicle-only injection was used as the control. After 2 weeks, the endometriosis-like lesions in mice were removed and digested, and the percentage of CD4⁺Foxp3⁺ Tregs (out of the total number of CD4⁺ T cells) (a, b) and the level of IL-10, TGF-β and CD73 expression in Tregs were determined (c–d) by flow cytometry. Administration of anti-mouse IL-10 neutralizing Abs (α-IL-10) or TGF-β receptor antagonist (SB431542) (α-TGF-β) limited endometriosis lesion growth (e). The expression of Ki67, MMP2 and Cox-2 in mouse ESCs was evaluated by immunohistochemistry (f). Original magnification: × 200. All data are expressed as the mean±S.D. *P<0.05, **P<0.01 compared with the vehicle control