Fig. 7
From: Urban particulate matter (PM) suppresses airway antibacterial defence
Effects of oxidative stress on the PM-dependent inhibition of airway epithelial antibacterial defence. a PM exposure further upregulated the expression of IL-8 but (b) downregulated the expression of IL-13. c and d The impeded induction of hBD-2 was partially reversed by NAC. Pre-treatment with NAC partially attenuated the PM-dependent increase in the CFU counts (e) and intracellular GFP-PAO1 (f). The results are expressed as the mean ± SD of three independent experiments. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, and ***P < 0.001 versus P0 (0 μg/ml). ##P < 0.01 versus P50 (50 μg/ml). NAC, N-acetylcysteine; IL, Interleukin; PM, PM-exposed cells; CFUs, colony-forming units