Plasma Hierarchical clustering and PCA
In contrast to BAL, plasma clusters were less well defined. When plotting IL-6 as a marker of immune inflammatory activation and Ct values, the BAL clusters were better delineated (Fig.3). A full description of the plasma clusters is provided in the supplemental material.
When comparing plasma and BAL cytokine concentrations, most cytokines were higher in the lung compartment except for IL-6 and IL-12. The ratio between plasma and BAL concetrations was not consistent across cytokines. The Dunn index was higher for the BAL clusters (1.2) compared to the plasma clusters (0.76).