Fig 3. Bacterial load in lung and spleen of mice intranasally infected with B. thailandensis and temporal effects of alcohol during infection.

Colony forming units (CFUs) per lung (A). Colony forming units (CFUs) per spleen (B). C57BL/6 mice were administered alcohol (4.4 g/kg) or PBS intraperitoneally (i.p.) and (0.5, 3, 6, or 24 h) later mice were inoculated intranasally with B. thailandensis. Dashed line represents the inoculating bacterial dose of (5 x 10⁵) CFUs. Tissues were collected 24 h post infection and bacterial tissue burden was determined (CFU/Tissue). Each bar represents the mean of each group administered alcohol at a respective time prior to infection with SD, N = 6 per group. Measured BAC (%) indicated with () and line represents average BAC measured from blood collected 0.5, 3, 6, or 24 h prior to infection from each group (0.254, 0.156, 0.0312, 0.0%) or PBS respectively. ND = Not Detected; no bacteria was cultured on any LB media plate. (Control) indicates infected and BAC 0.0%. Horizontal lines and asterisks (*) represent statistical comparison of (0.5 h alcohol prior to infection) and subsequent alcohol exposure prior to infection by Unpaired Student’s t-test, *, p ≤ 0.05, **, p ≤ 0.01.