Fig. 1: Analysis of immune cell populations from PBMC of ACM patients revealed decreased NK cell frequency and phenotypic changes of the classical monocyte subset.

a Frequencies of major blood leukocyte subsets of HC (n = 20) and ACM patients (n = 17) analyzed by flow cytometry. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, and ns not significant using Unpaired t-test or Mann–Whitney t-test. b Blood monocyte subsets of controls and ACM patients were characterized by flow cytometry using CD14 and CD16 staining. c Histograms showing monocyte subset frequencies percentages of monocytes positive for d CCR2, e HLA-DR, and f CD86 for the monocyte subsets of healthy controls (HC; n = 24) and ACM patients (ACM; n = 20). g Representative fluorescence overlay histograms show CCR2, HLA-DR, and CD86 expression by classical monocytes of HC and ACM patients compared to isotype mAb staining (gray). *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, and ns not significant using Unpaired t-test or Mann–Whitney t-test.