Mouse BMDCs or splenocytes were washed with PBS. For surface marker extracellular staining, the cells were incubated with anti-mouse CD11c (557,400, BD Biosciences), CD80 (560,526, BD Biosciences), CD86 (552,692, BD Biosciences), MHC-II (562,367, BD Biosciences), CD11b (101,211, Biolegend), CD4 (553,046, BD Biosciences), or CD8 antibodies (551,162, BD Biosciences) at 4 °C for 30 min. For intracellular cytokine staining, the splenocytes were stimulated with DnaJ (10 μg/ml) for 8 h in presence of Golgi plug™ (51-2301KZ, BD Bioscience). The splenocytes were then treated for surface markers (CD4 or CD8), fixed/permeabilised with a Cytofix/Cytoperm solution (51-2090KZ, BD Bioscience) and then stained with anti-IFN-γ (557,735, BD Biosciences) and anti-IL-4 (554,435, BD Biosciences) antibodies at 20–25 °C for 30 min. All events were acquired on a FACSverse flow cytometer and analysed using the FlowJoV software (Tree Star).
To determine cytokine (IFN-γ, TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-10, IL-17a, MCP-1, IL-1α, and IL-6) concentrations in the uterine tissue, multi-analyte flow assay kits (740,446, Biolegend, San Diego, CA, USA) were used as indicated by the manufacturer.
To determine cytokine (IFN-γ, TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-10, IL-17a, MCP-1, IL-1α, and IL-6) concentrations in the uterine tissue, multi-analyte flow assay kits (740,446, Biolegend, San Diego, CA, USA) were used as indicated by the manufacturer.