Figure 3.

Mice lacking pulmonary SP-D are more susceptible to bacterial infection. (A) Representative in vivo bioluminescence imaging of bacteria following intratrachial inoculation of P. aeruginosa in WT, KO and hTG mice. After infection, mice were imaged at each time points as listed below. (B) The bioluminescence signal in three groups of infected mice progressively increased and peaked at 48 h after infection. The KO mice showed higher level of bioluminescence than WT and hTG mice at 12 h after infection and beyond, whereas no significant difference between infected WT and hTG mice. *p < 0.05 vs WT or hTG, t test (n = 6/group). (C) The survival curves showed lower survival rate in infected KO mice compared to infected WT, but no difference between infected hTG mice and infected WT mice. *p < 0.05 vs WT, Log-rank test (n = 25/group).