Fig. 2
Cytokine secretion by human macrophages treated with conditioned media of BC cell lines. Cytokine secretion was measured in culture media conditioned by unstimulated macrophages (MΦ, grey circles) or stimulated with conditioned media from BCG-challenged or unchallenged BC cell lines: HT1376T, (white circles); HT1376sT (black circles). Cells were challenged with BCG for 2 h, then they were washed and allowed to condition the culture medium for 16 h. The conditioned culture media of BCG-challenged or unchallenged cells was used to stimulate human monocyte-derived macrophages for 24 h. MØ: cytokines released by unstimulated macrophages; MØ + unchallenged: cytokines released by macrophages stimulated with the conditioned medium of unchallenged HT1376 cells; MØ + BCG-challenged: cytokines released from macrophages stimulated with the conditioned medium of BCG-challenged cells. Data of three independent experiments are reported. Statistical analysis is reported in Additional file 2