Figure 1.
Cytotoxicity and hemolysis of LZ1.
(A) Cytotoxicity of LZ1 on human keratinocytes. (B) Hemolysis of LZ1 on human red blood cells. Data represent mean ± SE of five individual experiments.
Figure 2.
Effects of human plasma on the antibacterial activity of LZ1 and LL-37 against P. acnes ATCC6919 (A), S. epidermidis 09A3726 (B) and S. aureus 09B2499 (C).
Data represent mean ± SE of three individual experiments.
Figure 3.
Effects of LZ1 and clindamycin epicutaneous application on P. acnes-induced ear swelling.
The increase in ear thickness of the left ear was calculated as percentage of the right ear. Data represent mean ± SE of four individual experiments. The values for LZ1- or clindamycin-treated group were significant different from the value for the vehicle group (*P< 0.05, **P< 0.001).
Figure 4.
Histopathological analysis of mouse ears.
(A) Mouse ear injected with only 0.9% salt water. (B) After 24 h P. acnes challenge, ear swelling and the infiltrated inflammatory cells (arrows) surrounding the injection site of P. acnes (arrowhead) were observed. Image of inflammatory cells at higher magnification was shown in subsets, scale bar=10µm. (C) Ear swelling has not been changed by vehicle application. Clindamycin (D) and LZ1 application (E) effectively ameliorated ear swelling. (F) The number of infiltrated inflammatory cells was counted (*P< 0.05, **P< 0.001). Data are representative of four separate experiments with similar results. Scale bar =100µm. NC: no challenge by P. acnes; PC: mice subjected to P. acnes challenge for 24 h without any treatment.
Figure 5.
Effects of LZ1 on cytokine production induced by P. acnes.
(A) the effect of LZ1 and clindamycin on IL-1β production induced by P. acnes. (B) the effect of LZ1 and clindamycin on TNF-α production induced by P. acnes. Data represent mean ± SE of three individual experiments. The values for LZ1- or clindamycin-treated group were significant different from the value for the vehicle group (*P< 0.05, **P< 0.001).