, Oakville, ON, Canada) was dissolved at 1 mg/ml in

serum-free M199 culture medium at 60 °C as described previously (Nadeau et al., 1996). A solution of the electron-coupling reagent phenazine methosulfate (PMS, Sigma–Aldrich) was also prepared at 100 mM in culture medium. Immediately before the assay, the reagents were combined to produce a final concentration of 200 μg/ml XTT and 25 μM PMS. The culture medium was aspirated from the wells and replaced with 200 μl of XTT/PMS mix, and the plates were returned to the incubator for 2 h. An aliquot of the supernatants (175 μl) absent of particles (to prevent potential interference with the reading) was transferred to a new 96-well plate (Costar, Cambridge, MA, USA) and the absorbance was measured at 450 nm (Thermomax multiplate spectrophotometer, Molecular Devices, Sunnyvale, CA, USA). Decrease of XTT reduction by the macrophages PD0325901 ic50 was attributed to cytotoxicity of the particle preparations resulting in a loss of cell viability. The viability of cells exposed to particles was expressed relative to control cells without particles. The concentration of nitrite, a marker of nitric oxide production, was measured 22 h after the macrophages were stimulated with LPS/IFN-γ (24 h post particle

exposure). Culture supernatant aliquots (100 μl) were mixed with 100 μl of Griess reagent (Green et al., 1982) and the absorbance at 562 nm was read against a sodium nitrite standard curve (0–50 μM)

in a Thermomax multiplate spectrophotometer (Molecular Devices, Menlo Park, CA, USA). Chemiluminescence signal captured during the Panobinostat concentration 2 h incubation of alveolar macrophages with particulate matter (particle-induced respiratory burst) and after challenge with stimulants (stimulant-induced respiratory burst) was integrated (area under curve, AUC) as: equation(1) AUC=(t2-t1)×l1+[(t2-t1)×(l2-l1)]/2AUC=(t2-t1)×l1+[(t2-t1)×(l2-l1)]/2where t1 and t2 represent the start and end, respectively, of the time interval and l1 and l2 represent the raw luminescence value at t1 and t2, respectively. The AUC was summated over 2 h for particle effects, 40 min for PMA, and 5 h for Zymosan and Tau-protein kinase LPS/IFN-γ, and was used to express the effect of the particulate matter on the respiratory burst of the stimulated cells. Cell Viability (XTT reduction) and respiratory burst luminescence data were normalized relative to the relevant control mean values (0 μg dose of particles without stimulant for the particle-induced respiratory burst, and with stimulant for the stimulant-induced respiratory burst) to obtain fold effect for each particle dose. Potency (β) is derived from the following equation: equation(2) Fold Effect=(Dose+1)βFold Effect=(Dose+1)βwhere β is the slope of the dose response curve ( Vincent et al., 1997), as determined from the fit of dose–response data derived for each particle preparation using CurveExpert v1.3 (D. Hyams, Hixson, TN, USA).