Prepubertal vs pubertal whole blood gene expression in male and female mice

During the 1918 influenza pandemic, children experienced substantially lower mortality than adults, a striking but poorly understood finding. Whether this was due to enhanced resistance (reduced virus load) or better tolerance (reduced impact of infection) has not been defined. We found that prepubertal mice infected with H1N1 influenza virus also showed greater survival than infected pubertal mice, despite similar virus loads. To explore mechanisms for the survival differences, we compared gene expression profiles in whole blood leukocytes from normal, uninfected mice of both age groups. Whole blood from male and female C57Bl/6 mice was collected from 3-4 mice per group and RNA isolated for microarray analysis.