Clustering of adenosine A receptors with ectonucleotidases in caveolin-rich lipid rafts underlies immunomodulation by Leishmania amazonensis.

Extracellular adenosine plays important roles in modulating the immune responses. We have previously demonstrated that infection of dendritic cells (DC) by Leishmania amazonensis leads to increased expression of CD39 and CD73 and to the selective activation of the low affinity A receptors (A R), which contributes to DC inhibition, without involvement of the high affinity A R. To understand this apparent paradox, we now characterized the alterations of both adenosine receptors in infected cells.