Percentage of neutrophils stained by AS-D esterase in ALAs from hamsters and Balb/c mice.

Liver sections were stained with AS-D chloroacetate esterase. Neutrophils were identified by their well-known morphology and a positive stain. The total number of cells were counted in the inflammatory focus (8 infiltrates per slide/3 slides per animal), as were the number of cells positive to AS-D chloroacetate esterase (neutrophils) by using Image-Pro Plus 5.1 with 40x magnification. The percentage of neutrophils was calculated. During the evolution of hamster ALA, the percentage of neutrophils diminished progressively. In mice, the percentage of neutrophils was less compare with the hamsters but the changes showed similar behaviour, except at 24 hours. At the latter times post infection, the percentage of neutrophils was higher in mice than hamsters. Data represent the mean ± SD of the three independents experiments, (n = 5). P-values were determined by the Student’s t-test (*** p<0.001; ** p<0.01).