Antibodies directed to VE-cadherin increase endothelial permeability.

(A) Endothelial cells grown to confluency on glass coverslips were exposed to mAbs (50 μg/mL). Seven hours later, cells were fixed and processed for immunofluorescence analysis of VE-cadherin distribution (bar = 20 μm). (B) FITC-dextran passage through endothelial cell monolayers on Transwell filters was measured at different times after incubation with VE-cadherin mAbs. The mAb code is on the right. The background permeability values measured in absence of the mAbs was subtracted from each point of the curves. Values are mean ± SEM of at least 4 replicates of a typical experiments out of 5 performed. The permeability values obtained with Cad 5, BV6, and BV9 were always significantly different (P < .01) from the values obtained with Hec 1.2 by analysis of variance and the Duncan test. The permeability values obtained with TEA 1.31 were significantly different (P < .05) from Hec 1.2 only at 5 hours.