Figure 1.

Experimental design and Vra4 congenic region. (A) Experimental setup and diet regime based on different contents of vitamin D in rodent chow. 3-week-old newly-weaned female and male pups were assigned into three groups and subjected to either: (i) vitamin D deprived diet (0 IU/g); (ii) diet containing regular amount of vitamin D (2 IU/g), or (iii) vitamin D supplemented diet (10 IU/g). EAE was induced 5 weeks after initiation of the diet regimen, and lasted from 7 up to 40 days p.i., when the animals have been sacrificed for diverse analyses. (B) Vra4 congenic region on rat chromosome 10. The DA.PVGav1-Vra4 congenic strain harbors Vra4 fragment from PVG^av1 in the DA background. Vra4 is defined as a 5.3-Mb genomic region with the borders at which the lod score drops by 1.5 relative to the maximum linkage support in the quantitative-trait locus (QTL). The congenic region contains the candidate gene Mhc2ta close to the maximum lod peak. The PVG fragment in our DA. PVG^av1-Vra4 congenic strain spans from the acrocentric region of chromosome 10 to the marker D10Mit14.