Figure 2
No difference in the number of leukocytes or cytokine expression from CD4+ T cells in the CNS. Mononuclear cell preparations from brain and spinal cord were stained for flow cytometric analysis to detect differences in the phenotype of cellular infiltrates (a). The gating strategy allowed us to discriminate populations of microglia, macrophages, neutrophils, NK cells, CD4 and CD8 T cells (a) as well as CD4 T cell subsets (b). CD4 T cells were restimulated with MOG35-55 peptide and analyzed for cytokine production (c). Multi-parametric flow cytometric analysis was performed on polyfunctional CD4 T cell subsets capable of producing 3, 2, or 1 cytokine(s) simultaneously. Student's t-test revealed no significant differences between WT and Axl-/- mice. These data are representative of two experiments each performed in triplicate, with 4 mice/group/experiment at day 19.