Cell Culture
The immortalized microglia BV2 cell line was purchased from China Center for Type Culture Collection and the test for mycoplasma contamination was negative. Cells were cultured in DMEM medium with 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA, 10099141C) in a 5 % CO2 incubator at 37 °C. In vitro isolation and culture of primary microglia, cells were isolated from newborn Sprague-Dawley rat as previously described[12]. By utilizing anti-Iba1 antibodies (Millipore, MA, USA, MAB360, 1:300) for immunofluorescence staining, we verified the purity of the primary microglia cells was more than 95%. We used LPS-stimulated microglia cells to mimic the activated microglia after stroke. Vanillin was obtained from Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis, MO, USA, V1104).
tMCAO
Young adult C57BL/6 male mice (22g-26g) were purchased from Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine, with free access to food and water on light cycle 12/12 h light/dark. All procedures were in accordance with the Animal Use and Care Committee for Research and The Fifth affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University (No. 00081). All animals were randomly divided into groups according to their body weight before operation, and fasted for 12 hours. The mice were anesthetized with isoflurane and transient cerebral ischemia was induced by inserting a nylon monofilament into middle cerebral artery. Body temperature was maintained at 37°C through a feedback heating pad. tMCAO was induced by 90 min of reversible middle cerebral artery occlusion following by 24 hours reperfusion. Sham-operated animals only underwent the procedure of separating artery, but the nylon monofilament was not advanced into the artery. Animals’ exclusion criteria: death, subarachnoid hemorrhage, Berderson scoring less than 1 point or more than 4 points. During the whole procedure, investigators were blinded with the treatment group.
Groups and Berderson scoring
C57BL/6 mice were randomly divided into 5 groups. Different treatments were given after 90 min occlusion according to the grouping and body weight by tail vein injection. 1. Sham operation group (n=3). 2. tMCAO group (n=6): animals were given normal saline (8ml/kg) after 90 minutes of ischemia. 3. Low concentration (7mg/kg) of vanillin group (n=6): animals were given vanillin (7mg/kg) after 90 minutes of ischemia. 4. Medium concentration (28mg/kg) of vanillin group (n=6): animals were given vanillin (28mg/kg) after 90 minutes of ischemia. 5. High concentration (56mg/kg) of vanillin group (n=6): animals were given vanillin (56mg/kg) after 90 minutes of ischemia. Berderson scoring was performed after 24 hours reperfusion to evaluate neurological deficit as following: score 0: no obvious neurological deficit symptoms; 1: the left forelimb buckling to the chest wall, the right forelimbs extending to the ground when suspending; 2: failure to overcome the resistance; 3: rotating spontaneously towards the left; 4: no spontaneous walking; 5: animal death. The mice with a score of 1-3 were included in the experiment.
Quantitative evaluation of infarct volume
2,3,5-triphenyltetrazolium chloride (TTC) (Sigma-Aldrich, USA, T8877) staining was used to evaluate infarct volume. Following by 90 min ischemia and 24 hours reperfusion, mice were anesthetized deeply with isoflurane. The brain was rapidly removed and frozen at -20°C for 25 min. Then brain tissues were sliced coronally into 2-mm thick sections. The sections were stained with 1.0% TTC at 37°C for 15 min and fixed in a 4.0% paraformaldehyde solution at room temperature for 12 hours. Finally, the brain sections were photographed by a digital camera and analyzed using Adobe Photoshop CS6. The infarct volume was calculated as following: corrected infarct volume = contralateral brain volume - (ipsilateral brain volume - infarct volume).
Real-Time qPCR
Total RNA was obtained using Trizol kit (EZBioscience, USA, B0004D) according to the manufacturer’s procedure. Then cDNA was generated with 1μg of total RNA. After that, SuperReal qPCR PreMix (SYBR Green) (Tiangen, Beijing, China, FP202-01) was used to perform the RT-qPCR reaction on a 7500 Fast Real-time PCR system (Applied Biosystems, Foster City, CA, USA) according to the manufacturer’s procedure. Samples were subjected to 40 cycles of amplification at 95 °C for 15s and 60 °C for 60s. IL-1β: F:5’- CTTTGAAGAAGAGCCCGTCC-3’, R: 5’- GAGCTTTCAGCTCACATGGG-3’; TNF-α: F:5’- GACACCCCTGAGGGAGCTGA -3’, R: 5’- CTCCAAAGTAGACCTGCCCG -3’; IL-4: F:5’- CGAGATGTTTGTACCAGACG -3’, R: 5’- GAACCCCAGACTTGTTCTTC -3’; IL-10: F:5’- CAACATACTGCTGACAGATT -3’, R: 5’- CTGGGCCATGGTTCTCTGCC -3’; GAPDH: F:5’- TGGGGCCAAAAGGGTCATCA -3’, R: 5’- GCAGGATGCATTGCTGACAA -3’.
Cytokine Analysis by ELISA
Secretion levels of IL-1β, TNF-α, IL-4 and IL-10 in each group were detected by ELISA (RayBio, Atlanta, USA). The brain tissues were grinded with 500 μ L PBS with 1% protease inhibitor. The tissue or cell samples were performed by according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Three replicates of each sample were analyzed in each assay. Assays were repeated on three separate occasions.
Immunofluorescence
After 24 hours of ischemia/reperfusion, the brains were perfused with PBS, fixed with paraformaldehyde overnight, and embedded with paraffin. Next, the brains were coronally sliced into 10 μ m thick sections. The slices were dipped into xylene and series of ethanol gradient in order to dewax and rehydrate. The brain slices or fixed cell culture were blocked by 10% horse serum albumin (Biosharp, China, BL209A) and then incubated with anti-IL-1β antibody (RD, Minnesota, USA, AF-401), anti-TNF-α antibody (CST, Massachusetts, USA, 11948), anti-IL-4 antibody (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA, PA5-115416), anti-IL-10 antibody (Abcam, Cambridge, UK, ab33471) and anti-Iba1 antibody (Millipore, MA, USA, MAB360, 1:300) overnight at 4°C. These were followed by incubation with corresponding secondary antibodies and then the nuclei were stained with Hoechst (Solarbio, China, B8040) at room temperature. Images were captured with a Nikon A1 spectral confocal microscope.
Western blotting
The levels of TLR4, NF-κB p65, and phosphorylated NF-κB p65 expression were measured by Western blot. Total proteins were lysed in M-PERTM Mammalian Protein Extraction Reagent (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA, 78503) containing with protease inhibitor cocktail (Millipore Corporation, Bedford, MA, USA, 539131-10 VL). Protein concentrations of each sample were qualified by using a BCA protein assay kit (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA, 23225). Protein samples (30 μg per lane) were separated on 12% SDS-PAGE and then transblotted onto PVDF membranes (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA, 88520). Blots were blocked with 5% skim milk for 1 hour and then were incubated with the primary antibodies against TLR4 (SAB, Maryland, USA, 35463), NF-κB p65 (SAB, Maryland, USA, 11014), phosphorylated NF-κB p65 (SAB, Maryland, USA, 21014) and GAPDH. After 12 hours, the membranes were incubated with corresponding secondary antibodies for 1 hour at room temperature. Finally, the blot images were detected with enhanced chemiluminescence reagent (Millipore, MA, USA, WBKLS0500) and captured using ChemiDocTM MP System (Bio-Rad, UK).
Statistical analysis
GraphPad Prism 6.0 and IBM SPSS Statistics 25 were used to analyze the experimental data. All data were given as the mean ± SD. Data were analyzed by one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) followed by the post hoc comparisons LSD test for multiple comparisons. P-values less than 0.05 was considered as statistically significant.