Fig. 5

Quantification of Foxp3⁺ Treg cells in H. pylori infected mouse gastric tissues. H. pylori infected and uninfected gastric tissues were stained for regulatory T cell marker Foxp3 and CD4. Foxp3 were stained with fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) (green) (Ia–Va), CD4 were stained with Texas red (red) (Ib–Vb), nuclei were stained with DAPI (Ic–Vc), while (Id–Vd) represent their merge pictures (a). Representative immunostaining of regulatory T cells for control (I), AM1/AM1 infected (II), SS1/SS1 infected (III), SS1/AM1-coinfected (IV) and AM1/SS1-coinfected (V) gastric tissues were observed at 40× magnification. The red arrow shows the co-localization of Foxp3 and CD4 in H. pylori-infected mouse gastric tissues (Id–Vd). Average numbers of FoxP3⁺ cells in each tissue sections were assessed from 10 different fields (1 mm²). Bar diagrams showed the average number of FoxP3⁺ cells present in different groups (b). Error bars ±SEM ***P < 0.001; **P < 0.01; *P < 0.05; NS, P = not significant versus control