Figure 10. Analysis of transcriptional expression of immune-associated genes in cochlear tissues.

A. Comparison of the transcriptional expression of four immune-related genes in the control, 2-day, and 20-day post-noise groups. There is a significant upregulation in all examined genes at 2-days after noise exposure and the recovery of the expression levels at 20-days after noise exposure. n = 5 biological replicates for each condition (* indicates P < 0.05, ** indicates P < 0.01 and *** indicates P < 0.001). B. Expression variation of the four examined genes across the five examined samples in the control and 20-day noise group (N1–20d). The five samples came from five individual mice. The value of each dot represents the difference between the expression level of a gene in a particular sample and the group mean of the expression of that gene. Notice that the expression variation is relatively homogenous across the five samples in the control group. In contrast, the expression variation increases in the noise group. All four genes in sample 1 display lower expression levels in the noise group than those of the control group. Conversely, all the four genes in sample 5 display higher expression levels in the noise group than those of the control group. This observation suggests that mice display a large individual variation in the recovery of the expression levels of the pro-inflammatory mediators.