Fig. 3

Impact of tick saliva on mouse mast cell inflammatory response. Primary MCs from C57BL/6 mice were activated with Borrelia burgdorferi (s.s.) 297 strain (MOI 50:1) in the absence (white bars) or presence (black bars) of tick salivary gland extract (SGE: 20 μg/ml). After 2 h, the level of degranulation was evaluated by measuring β-hexasominidase release and percentage degranulation was calculated (a). After 24 h, supernatants were collected to measure IL-6 concentration by ELISA (b). After 6 h, RNAs were collected to measure IL-6 and MCP-1 mRNA expression (c, d). *P < 0.05; **P < 0.01; ***P < 0.001