Figure 1. Bordetella pseudohinzii (Bph) Induces a Th17 Response in the Lungs of Colonized Mice.
(A) Comparison of the abundance of virulence factor classes encoded in the genomes of members in the genus Bordetella. Virulence factors were identified by sequence alignment to the Virulence Factor Database (VFDB) and binned into functional groups defined by VFDB (Chen et al., 2016). Assemblies of Bph isolates described in this study (2–1 and 5–5) are also shown.
(B) Recovery of Bph from respiratory tract samples over a 184-day period. CFUs per section of tissue or mL of lavage fluid are shown. Box indicates 25th and 75th percentiles and whiskers are 1.5 × interquartile range. n = 2–6 mice per time point.
(C) Representative hematoxylin and eosin staining of mice that received either HK (top panel) or live (bottom panel) Bph taken 60 days after inoculation.
(D–F) Flow cytometry of lung tissue digests from mice 30 days after that received HK (blue) or live Bph (red) inoculation. n = 9–10 mice/group, combined from two independent experiments.
(D) Neutrophils as a percentage of live cells from lung. Neutrophils were defined as CD11b+Ly6G+.
(E) Percentage of Teff (CD4+TCRβ+FoxP3−CD44hiCD62Llo) cells from the lungs as a percentage of total T-helper cells.
(F) Percentages of IL-17A+IFNγ−-secreting T-helper 17 (Th17) cells from the lungs.
Statistical significance: Mann-Whitney U test. Horizontal lines indicate median values. *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001; ****p < 0.0001.