Fig. 6

Density of astrocytes is reduced in the IL-6 KO MRL/lpr entorhinal cortex. Given potential cortical and hippocampal glial changes in the presence of IL-6, we performed immunofluorescent histologic analysis of astrocyte (GFAP + cells) and microglia (Iba + cells) numbers in the brains of IL6 KO relative to IL-6 WT lupus mice belonging to Cohort B. A, B The two-dimensional density of both cell types was assessed in cross-sections of the entorhinal cortex, somatosensory cortex, retrosplenial cortex, amygdala, and hippocampal dentate gyrus. C, D Comparisons of the density of GFAP + cells (astrocytes) and Iba1 + cells (microglia) between the entorhinal cortical regions of IL-6 WT and IL-6 KO mice. E Representative images of GFAP staining in the entorhinal cortices of IL-6 WT (left) and IL-6 KO (right) mice. Arrows point to a random sampling of stained cells. Coronal brain sections in panels A and B were obtained from the Harvard High Resolution Mouse Brain Atlas published by Sidman et al. [113]. *p < 0.05