Table 1.
Clinical characteristics of the study subjects.
Fig 1.
Up-regulation of LRG in asthmatic patients.
Levels of LRG in sputum obtained from healthy volunteers and patients with asthma. Concentrations of sputum LRG were determined by ELISA. The Mann-Whitney U-test was used for statistical analysis. The individual values are provided in S2 File.
Table 2.
Correlations between sputum LRG concentration and sputum total cell counts.
Fig 2.
Detection of LRG in BALF, serum and lung section in a murine model of asthma.
A) Levels of LRG in BALF and serum in a mouse model of asthma. Concentrations of BALF and serum LRG were determined by ELISA. The Student’s t-test was used for statistical analysis. The individual values are provided in S3B–S3E File) Localization of LRG in mouse lung. Paraffin sections of the lung from control (B and D) and OVA-treated (C and E) mouse were stained with anti-LRG antibody (B and C) and PAS (D and E). Scale bar, 100 μm. F and G) Immunohistochemisry of MUC5AC (F) and LRG (G) of the lung from OVA-treated mouse. Arrows show MUC5AC (F) or LRG (G) positive cells. Scale bar, 20 μm
Fig 3.
Induction of LRG in primary bronchial epithelial cells.
A) LRG secretion in culture supernatant by primary bronchial epithelial cells. Cells were incubated with IL-13 for 5 days and then treated with indicated cytokines for 24 h. Control cells were incubated without IL-13 for 5 days and further stimulated by cytokines. LRG protein in culture supernatant was detected by western blot. B) LRG gene expression in primary bronchial epithelial cells treated with IL-13 for 5 days. Cells were stimulated by indicated cytokines for 6 h. LRG mRNA expression was analyzed by quantitative PCR. Dunnett’s test was used for statistical analysis. The individual values are provided in S4 File.