Figure 6.

Effect of synbiotic on human umbilical vein endothelial cell culture (HUVEC) integrity to ethanol and/or LPS exposure. Confluent HUVEC monolayers seeded on transwells and/or on glass coverslips in a 24-well culture plate were exposed to ± ethanol (40 mM), ± LPS (1 µg/mL), and ± sodium butyrate (2 mM) on the apical surface for 6 h. (A) Transendothelial resistance (TER-ohms) was measured at baseline and 6 h after treatment using a World Precision volt/ohm meter electrical resistance system. TER values represent changes between baseline and 6 h exposures. Data are the mean ± SEM of five independent experiments performed in duplicate. Immunostaining was performed for (B,C) CD31 (green); (D,E) Claudin-5 (green); and (F,G) VE-cadherin (green). All images were acquired using a 10x objective, and a selected area was cropped an enlarged. Images are representative of at least replicate images captured in three independent experiments. Immunofluorescent images were semi-quantified. ** p < 0.001; * p < 0.05. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS); Ethanol (ET); Butyrate (But).