Fig. 4: Neuroinflammation.

a Immunohistochemistry of T lymphocytes (CD3 positive, upper row) and macrophages/ activated microglia (MAC3 positive, lower row) in cortex, hippocampus and meninges of Rnaset2^−/− mice revealed diffuse infiltration. Scale bar, 100 µm. b Co-immunostaining of CD3⁺ and CD8⁺ cells in white matter showed that most infiltrated T cells were CD8 positive. Scale bar, 50 µm. c Systematic evaluation of perivascular CD3⁺ cell infiltrations in standard slices from five Rnaset2^−/− and control mice underline the involvement of the whole CNS. Of note, grey and white matter were involved in all regions. C = cerebrum, BS = brain stem, Cb = cerebellum, SC = spinal cord, Mi = meningeal inflammation, N/A = not analyzed. Images in a, b are representative of these five animals. d FACS analysis of total CNS (brain and spinal cord). Data depicted as the mean ± SEM. p values of two-tailed Mann–Whitney test and two-tailed Student’s t-test (only for microglia) are represented as *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001 and not significant p ≥ 0.05 of Rnaset2^−/− (n = 8) and control mice (n = 8). Rnaset2^−/− mice revealed significantly increased numbers of CD4⁺ T-cells (CD45⁺ TCRβ⁺ CD4⁺, p = 0.0019), CD8⁺ T-cells (CD45⁺ TCRβ⁺ CD8⁺, p = 0.0002), B cells (CD45⁺ CD19⁺, p = 0.0006) and inflammatory monocytes (CD45⁺ CD11b⁺ Ly6C^hi CCR2⁺, p = 0.0281) whereas microglia cells (CD45^int CD11b^int Ly6C⁻ Ly6G⁻) were not significantly different (p = 0.7014); data pooled from three independent experiments. e Significant elevation (p = 0.0118) of CD8⁺ effector memory T cells (CD45⁺ TCRβ⁺ CD8⁺ CD44^hi CD62L⁻) in Rnaset2^−/− mice by FACS analysis, n = 6 Rnaset2^−/− and control mice; data pooled from three independent experiments. Data presented as mean ± SEM. p values of two-tailed Student’s t-test is depicted *p < 0.05. The corresponding gating strategy is depicted in Supplementary Fig. 7. Source data are provided as a Source data file.