Activation of PKCζ increases the permeability of ECs. (A) Wild-type PKCζ does not affect basal- or thrombin-induced permeability. ECs were infected with pAdEasy-1 adenovirus empty vector (EV) or pAdEasy-1 constructs encoding wild-type PKCζ (WT), 2 days prior to assay. Cells were either untreated or treated with thrombin at 0.2 U/mL (T). FITC-dextran passage (μg/mL) during 30 minutes is shown. Data shown are means ± standard error of the mean (SEM) of the pool of 3 experiments where each experiment was performed in triplicate. (B) Dominant-negative PKCζ blocks thrombin-stimulated permeability increases in ECs. ECs were infected with pAdEasy-1 adenovirus empty vector (EV) or dominant-negative PKCζ (DN) or constitutively active PKCζ (CA) 2 days prior to assay. Cells were either untreated or treated with thrombin at 0.2 U/mL (T). FITC-dextran passage (measured in μg/mL) during 30 minutes is shown. Data are the means ± SEM of a pool of 2 experiments where each experiment was performed in triplicate for each group. ^*P < .005 (compared with EV and T).