IHC was done as previously described (19 (link)). Briefly, 5 μm sections of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue were de-paraffinized and rehydrated with ethanol. Antigen retrieval was done in water bath heating at 97° with citrate buffer PH6 (Thermofisher). Immune labeling was done using overnight incubation at 4° with anti ITGAX (CD11C) 1:20 dilution (Myebiosource, San Diego, USA) and anti MHCII 1:100 dilution (abcam, Cambridge, USA). Detection of the primary antibody was done with Horeseradish peroxidase (HRP) and Diaminobenzidine (DAB) substrate (Thermofisher). Multiple random photomicrographs were taken for each lymph node in the paracortex region and gingival tissues in the lamina propria, at 40x objective lens using Zeiss microscope (Zeiss AxioIma, Carl Zeiss Microscopy GmbH, Jena, Germany) and quantification was done blindly using automated Image-J software (https://imagej.nih.gov/ij/) with a set threshold based on the negative control.