Afterwards, slides were mounted with Vectashield (Vector Laboratories). Images were obtained via confocal laser microscopy (LSM 510 META scanning; Zeiss, Göttingen, Germany). A semiquantitative analysis of dermal positive cells for CD163 and IDO in skin lesions of BT (n = 6) and LL (n = 6) patients was performed and classified as: (−) no positive cells, (+) presence of few positive cells (up BI 6727 solubility dmso to 5% of cells), (++) positive cells present in focuses on the inflammatory infiltrate, comprising 20% of cells, (+++) several positive cells, comprising 50%, and (++++) numerous positive cells, representing most of the cellular infiltrate (more than 50% of cells). The analysis of results was performed twice with no disagreement

on the issue. CD163 expression was quantified by Western blot analysis. As previously described, protein extracts were obtained [6] from 30 slices (10 μm) of frozen patient skin biopsies (BT, n = 4 and LL, n = 4) after which 30 μg of the extracts were loaded in 12% SDS-PAGE and blotted onto nitrocellulose Target Selective Inhibitor Library manufacturer membranes (Bio-Rad) with a semi-dry transfer cell (Bio-Rad). CD163 expression

was evaluated after incubation with monoclonal mouse anti-human CD163 clone EDHu-1 (AbD Serotec, EUA) (1: 100) and monoclonal mouse anti-human Tubulin (Sigma-Aldrich, St. Louis, Missouri, USA) (1: 10000). Results were visualized through an enhanced chemiluminescence detection system (ECL; Amersham Biosciences, Piscataway, NJ, USA). Total RNA was extracted from frozen skin fragments (LL, n = 5 and BT, n = 5), which were repaired using the Trizol reagent (Invitrogen Corporation, Carlsbad, CA, USA). The cDNA synthesis, using the

Taqman PCR, was performed as described above [6]. Glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate these dehydrogenase (GAPDH) was used as an endogenous control and IDO, IL-10, and CD163 mRNA were quantified via the 2−ΔCt. Immunofluorescence was performed to verify the expression of CD68+, CD163+, and IDO+ cells. The skin macrophage cells were fixed in paraformaldehyde 4% and then incubated with the primary antibodies for 2 h at room temperature. After washing, the secondary antibody (anti-IgG1 for CD163 and CD68 and anti-IgG for IDO) was incubated and the nucleus was marked with DAPI. The images were obtained from Microscope Axio Observer Z1 (Carl Zeiss, Göttingen, Germany) via Axiovision 4.7 software. Cell isolation from skin biopsies was performed as previously described by Moura et al. [38]. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were isolated under endotoxin-free conditions from heparinized venous blood by Ficoll-Hypaque (Pharmacia Fine Chemicals, Piscataway, NJ, USA) density centrifugation. PBMC were then cultured in tissue culture plates at 37°C/5% CO2. Monocyte purification was done for 2 h adherence in 24-well plates (Costar, Cambridge, MA, USA) at 2 × 106 cells per well. Live and dead ML at an MOI (2.5; 5 and 10: 1) isolated from LL leprosy patients, E. coli (5: 1), M.