Fig. 2

Impaired motor performance in LPS-injected mice. Bar charts representing the effect of LPS-induced neuroinflammation on motor performance examined by rotarod test at 12 rotations per minute (RPM) (a) and at 20 RPM (b) as well as by Foot-slip test (c) in WT, Cx32 KO, and KO T55I mice, as indicated. Time required for the animal to fall off the rotarod was recorded using a timer. Saline injected animals of all three genotypes were able to stay much longer on the rotarod compared to LPS injected animals at both speeds tested (a, b). Even at baseline levels KO T55I performed worse that simple KO animals, while WT animals outer-performed KO animals both in control and in LPS groups (data shown in Additional file 6: Table S2). Foot-slip analysis (c) revealed that LPS-injected animals showed more missteps compared to saline-injected controls of all three genotypes. Additionally, more missteps were shown by Cx32 KO compared to WT mice, and by T55I KO compared to simple KO mice, both at baseline and after LPS (Student’s t-test, *:p < 0.05, **:p < 0.01, ***:p < 0.001, Bonferroni corrected)