Figure 5.

T cell immune response after TBI progress differently in K14-VEGFR3-Ig and WT littermate mice. Panels (A, B) represent the number and frequency of TCRβ+ T cells (A) and the CD4/CD8 ratio (B) in the brain of WT and TG mice, as analyzed in the perilesional and contralateral cortices 3 days post injury (WT ipsi, n = 4; WT contra, n = 4; TG ipsi, n = 3; TG contra, n = 3). No differences between the genotypes have been observed. (C–F) Analysis of T cells infiltration in the brain of K14-VEGFR3-Ig and WT littermate mice 60 days post-injury (WT ipsi, n = 5; WT contra, n = 5; TG ipsi, n = 4; TG contra, n = 4). Box plot represents the number of infiltrating T cells, defined by expression of TCRβ (C) and stacked bargram represents the percentage of CD4+ and CD8+ T cells (D) in the perilesional areas (ipsi) and correspondent contralateral areas (contra) of WT and TG mice. Bargrams in (C, D) show respectively the frequencies of CD8+ and CD4+ T cell subpopulations, as analyzed in the perilesional cortices of WT and TG mice. In CD8+ subpopulation we observed a significant reduction in the frequency of the CD44^hiCD69+ subpopulation in K14-VEGFR3-Ig compared to WT mice, which corresponded to the increase in the frequency of CD44^negCD69+ phenotype. In CD4+ subpopulation, instead, we did not observed differences in distribution between the two genotypes. Data are presented as median ± SD. A binomial negative regression or a linear mixed model was applied to assess statistical differences in the counts of TCRβ + T cells. The Kruskal Wallis test was used for the analysis of frequency distribution. **p < 0.01 vs. WT ipsi. #p < 0.05 vs. respective contra. In all tests, Bonferroni correction was used to adjust p-values in multiple comparisons.