Figure 3

Strongly increased MARCO expression in astrocytes after Neisseria meningitides infection in an infant rat model of meningitis. Coronal brain sections from rats infected with Neisseria meningitidis (NM) or Streptococcus pneumoniae (SP) were fixed at defined time-points after infection and immunolabeled using anti-MARCO (green) and anti-glial fibrillary acidic protein (anti-GFAP) antibodies to identify astrocytes with nuclear counterstaining (blue). Sections were examined by double fluorescence microscopy. The figures show representative results from one of three independent experiments. Scale bar = 200 μm for overview and 20 μm for the other images. (B) Shows a detail of (A). Please note that the detail shows a strong colocalization between GFAP and MARCO in the sub-cortical layer after NM infection.