Fig. 5

The concentrations of CXCL1, CXCL2, and Th17 cytokines in serum and cerebrospinal fluid. The concentrations of CXCL1, CXCL2, IL-17A, IL-17F, and IL-22 in serum (S) and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of patients in the neurologic phase of tick-borne encephalitis (TBE; n = 15), patients with non-TBE aseptic meningitis (AM; n = 6, CXCL2, IL-17A, and IL-17F only), and controls (C; n = 7). For TBE, the concentrations prior to the neurologic phase (P; n = 4, red symbols for patients 1 and 2 studied in the peripheral phase and orange symbols for patients 3 and 4 studied at the onset of the neurologic phase), in the active phase of the infection on admission to hospital (I), during early follow-up examinations before the discharge 10–14 days later (II; n = 13) and during late follow-up 4–8 weeks later (III; n = 5, CXCL1 and IL-22 only) are shown. Concentrations are expressed in pg/ml and presented in logarithmic scale. Individual data points are shown with dots and median values with short horizontal lines. In TBE group, 4 patients with clinically diagnosed encephalitis (as opposed to meningitis) are highlighted with empty symbols instead of filled dots. The thick horizontal lines at the bottom of panels denote the detection thresholds. Significant differences are highlighted by symbols at the top of each plot. *Significantly higher in comparison with controls (p < 0.05). **The same with p < 0.01. ****The same with p < 0.0001. ^∈Significantly higher in TBE patients with meningoencephalitis than with meningitis (p < 0.05). ^Significant decrease in examination II in comparison with examination I (p < 0.05). ^^The same with p < 0.01. ^##Significantly higher concentration in CSF than simultaneously in serum (p < 0.01). ^&Significantly higher concentration in AM than simultaneously in TBE (p < 0.05). ^~Higher concentration in TBE than simultaneously in AM with p = 0.066; half-star symbol in CXCL1 panel—concentration in TBE early serum samples higher than in C with p = 0.073