MicroRNA profiles of mouse tissues following infection with Toxoplasma gondii

The 8-10 weeks-old female Balb/c mice (SPF) were purchased from Spaefer Biotechnology Co., Ltd. (Beijing, China). All the mice were housed in cages with an independent ventilation system under a 12-h dark/light cycle, with free food and water. The mice (n=18) were randomly divided into six groups: an acute and high dose infection group (n = 3); a chronic and high infection group (n = 3), both two groups all infected with the 20 T. gondii cysts, and a control group (n = 3) treated with PBS; an acute and low dose infection group (n = 3); an chronic and low dose infection group (n = 3)both two groups all infected with the 10 T. gondii cysts, and a control group (n = 3) treated with PBS; Mice in each of the groups were killed at 11 (acute infection group) and 33 days (chronic infection group) after infection, respectively. The detection of the successful establishment of the mouse model as described previously. The livers of each group were dissected from each mouse and removed the blood. Then, the liver samples were immediately deposited in liquid nitrogen until RNA extraction. For the construction of the small RNA library, 3 micrograms of RNA sample was performed.