Detection of cellular IFN and viral LMP1 in lupus patients.

The SELENA-SLEDAI scores and the various descriptors at the time of blood collections are listed. The positive cells were identified by expression intensity similar to the positive control (Figure 5E). The numbers of cells for either IFN-alpha or LMP1-postive are very few, and the percentages could not be used to represent the frequency. If several positive cells were positively identified in a specimen, the score “+” was given. However if two or fewer positive cells were identified in approximate 5×106 PBMC, it were scored as negative (−). The reason to use two positive cells as a cutoff was to avoid any artificial signals. N1–N6: normal, healthy individuals' bloods.