The transcript levels of several important cytokines and chemokines that have been reported to contribute to Lyme disease progression, such as IL-10, IL-1β, TNF-α, and CCL2 [61–68], were upregulated in the WT- but not MT-infected tissues (Fig 11B), which was validated by qRT-PCR (Fig 11C). Here, CCL2 is linked to Lyme disease.