Fig. 4

Activation of human neutrophils by cholinergic mediators. Neutrophils from the a peripheral blood or b sputum of COPD patients were incubated with aclidinium bromide (Acl), hexamethonium (HEX) or acetylcholinesterase (AChE) for 1 h and then stimulated with carbachol (CCh) or lipopolysaccharide (LPS) for 6 h. Cell supernatants were collected to measure interleukin (IL)-8 release. The results are expressed as the mean ± SD (n = 4 COPD cell populations in independent experiments run in triplicate). A two-way ANOVA was followed by a post hoc Bonferroni test. *p < 0.05 vs. control unstimulated cells; #p < 0.05 vs. stimulated cells