Fig. 4

Effects of IL-27 on IL-18 and IL-18bp gene expression and release from hemozoin-exposed endothelial cells. Human aortic endothelial cells were primed with recombinant (rh)IL-27 (100 ng/mL, 1 h) and incubated with 10, 50 and 100 μg/mL hemozoin (Hz) for 22 h. IL-18 (A) and IL-18bp (B) were measured in supernatants from the cells with EIA. Gene expression analyses for IL-18 (C) and IL-18bp (D) were analyzed by qPCR, related to reference gene β-actin/TaqMan reference probes and normalized to unstimulated cells (US). Results are representatives of minimum three experiments and data are presented as mean and SEM. ***p < 0.001 versus US (white bar), ^††p < 0.01 and ^†††p < 0.001 versus Hz (blue bars) and ^###p < 0.001 versus IL-27 (hatched bars)