Silencing of IL-24 attenuates the severity of PA infection in mouse cornea. Mice were subconjunctivally injected with IL-24 siRNA (50 picomoles in 5ul RNase free water) twice in two days. Corneas were inoculated with PA 6h after the second injection. Non-specific siRNA serves as control. (A) Immunoblot analysis of IL-24, p-STAT3, and STAT3 in cell lysates of IL-24 siRNA- or control siRNA-treated corneas at 1 dpi. β-actin serves as the loading control. (B) Quantification of protein levels based on the densitometry of the Western blots in A. (C) Mice were monitored and photographed daily up to 3 dpi. (D) Clinical scores were assigned to each cornea daily and plotted as median + interquartile range. At 3 dpi, the corneas were excised and subjected to bacterial plate counting (E) and MPO assay (F). P values were generated by Man-Whitney test (D) or unpaired student t test (B, E and F). *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01 and ***P < 0.001. Data are representative of three independent experiments with five mice per group (B, E and F: mean + s.e.m.).