Figure 4. Investigation into the in vivo role of TRIL in the E.coli induced Gram-negative sepsis model and following intracranial LPS challenge.

A, Expression of Tril measured by RT-PCR in both spleen and brain samples derived from WT and Tril^-/- mice infected with E.coli strain BL21 (10⁹ CFU) for 6 h (n=4). mRNA levels of Tril were normalized to beta-Actin and expressed in arbitrary units (A.U). B, Bacterial dissemination in the spleen and brain of WT mice following intraperitoneal E.coli infection for 6 h. C, Gene expression profile generated using RNA isolated from the brain of WT and Tril^-/- mice. Gene expression profile is displayed as a heat map (log10 transformed) with hierarchical clustering indicated by dendrogram. Upregulated genes are shown in red, downregulated genes are represented in green. D-G, Cytokine expression measured by RT-PCR in brain (top panel) and spleen (bottom panel) of WT and Tril^-/- mice infected with E.coli (10⁹ CFU, colony forming units) for 6 h (n=5-7). Data are presented as a mean ± SEM of two (A and B) or three (D-G) independent experiments, each carried out in triplicates. *, p<0.05. H and I, Cytokine expression measured by RT-PCR in brain of WT and Tril^-/- mice following 24h of intracranial LPS challenge (2μg of LPS or saline control per mice) (n=2-7). Data are presented as a mean ± SEM of two independent experiments, each carried out in triplicate. **, p<0.01, *, p<0.05.