Enhancement of Methacholine-Evoked Tracheal Contraction Induced by Bacterial Lipopolysaccharides Depends on Epithelium and Tumor Necrosis Factor

Figure 5

Effect of LPS and TNFα on maximal responses evoked by MCh in spontaneously TLR4-deficient C3H/HeJ mice and their counterpart controls, C3H/HePas mice. Tracheal segments were isolated from C3H/HeJ (a and c) and C3H/HePas (b and d) mice and incubated with LPS, 5 μg/mL for 90 min, (a and b) or with TNFα, 10 ng/mL for 90 min, (c and d) control tissues were obtained by incubating tracheas with saline. The contractile responses to increasing concentrations of methacholine were recorded using a myograph. Data are expressed as mean ± SEM and are representative of 5 experiments (unpaired t-test. *𝑃<0.05, **𝑃<0.01, ***𝑃<0.001 as compared to control).

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