Noninvasive In Vivo Quantification of Neutrophil Elastase Activity in Acute Experimental Mouse Lung Injury

Figure 4

Effect of sivelestat on the activation of NE680 ex vivo in lung sections. CD-1 mice were challenged with LPS and fMLP, lungs collected 5 h after fMLP and snap frozen. Vehicle-treated mice served as controls. Lung NE activity was assessed in situ by incubating lung sections (10 μm thick) with 1 μM NE680 at 37°C for 5 h in the absence or presence of the NE inhibitor sivelestat. Fluorescent microscopy images were captured with an acquisition time of 2.5 s using a microscope equipped with xenon light source and Cy5.5 filters. Shown are representative images at a final 400× magnification. In blue, DAPI nuclear stain, in red, activated NE agent.