Fig. 6

DRD3 deficiency results in an unresponsive phenotype of astrocytes in the midbrain of mice undergoing systemic inflammation induced by LPS. WT or DRD3KO mice were treated with an i.p. injection of LPS (5 mg/kg) or PBS (control). Twenty-four hours later, the midbrain/striatum structures were isolated, disaggregated and the inflammatory and anti-inflammatory phenotypes of astrocytes were analysed by flow cytometry. a Gating strategy used to analyse the inflammatory (iNOS⁺ cells) and anti-inflammatory (Arg1⁺ cells) phenotypes in living (ZAq⁻) astrocytes (GFAP⁺ cells). b Representative contour-plots indicating the percentage of pro-inflammatory glia (red numbers) and anti-inflammatory glia (blue numbers). c Quantification of the frequencies of inflammatory (left panel) and anti-inflammatory (middle panel) phenotypes and the inflammatory-to-anti-inflammatory ratio (right panel). Data from eight mice per group is shown. Each symbol represents a WT (white) or a DRD3KO (black) animal. In each experimental group, the line and error bars represent the mean ± SEM, respectively. *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01 by one-way ANOVA followed by Tukey’s post-hoc test