Molecular and cellular characterization of tumors is essential due to the complex and heterogeneous nature of cancer. In recent decades, many bioinformatic tools and experimental techniques have been developed to achieve personalized characterization of tumors. However, sample handling continues to be a major challenge as limitations such as prior treatments before sample acquisition, the amount of tissue obtained, transportation, or the inability to process fresh samples pose a hurdle for experimental strategies that require viable cell suspensions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Lrba is a cytoplasmic protein involved in vesicular trafficking. -deficient () mice exhibit substantially higher levels of IgA in both serum and feces than wild-type (WT) mice. Transforming growth factor β1 (TGFβ1) and its receptors (TGFβR I and II) is essential for differentiating IgA+ B cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe mechanisms that negatively regulate inflammation upon a pathogenic stimulus are crucial for the maintenance of tissue integrity and organ function. T regulatory cells are one of the main drivers in controlling inflammation. The ability of T regulatory cells to adapt to different inflammatory cues and suppress inflammation is one of the relevant features of T regulatory cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIL-9 is a pleiotropic cytokine associated with various processes, including antitumor immunity, induction of allergic pathologies, and the immune response against helminth infections, where it plays an important role in the expulsion of the parasite. In a murine model of Nippostrongylus brasiliensis infection, IL-9 is produced mainly by CD4+ T lymphocytes and innate lymphoid cells found in the lung, small intestine, and draining lymph nodes. Given the technical difficulties involved in the intracellular staining of IL-9, as well as the complexity of isolating hematopoietic cells from the small intestine upon infection, there is a pressing need for a comprehensive but straightforward protocol to analyze the expression of IL-9 in different lymphoid and non-lymphoid tissues in this model.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlthough IL-9 has potent anti-tumor activity in adoptive cell transfer therapy, some models suggest that it can promote tumor growth. Here, we show that IL-9 signaling is associated with poor outcomes in patients with various forms of lung cancer, and is required for lung tumor growth in multiple mouse models. CD4 T cell-derived IL-9 promotes the expansion of both CD11c and CD11c interstitial macrophage populations in lung tumor models.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFType 2 Innate lymphoid cells (ILC2s) are tissue-resident immune cells activated by epithelial-derived alarmins upon tissue damage. They regulate immunity against helminth parasites and allergies by expressing type 2 immune response cytokines including IL-9, known to be critical for inducing and potentiating the immune response in such context. Although ILC2s are reported to be the main source of IL-9 in mice during infection, the mechanisms that regulate the expression of IL-9 in these cells are yet to be described.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Immunol Res
April 2022
The process by which blood cells are generated has been widely studied in homeostasis and during pathogen-triggered inflammatory response. Recently, murine lungs have been shown to be a significant source of hematopoietic progenitors in a process known as extramedullary hematopoiesis. Using multiparametric flow cytometry, we have identified mesenchymal, endothelial, and hematopoietic progenitor cells that express the secreted small protein Isthmin 1 (ISM1).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAcute lymphocytic leukemia is the most common type of cancer in pediatric individuals. Glucose regulated protein (GRP78) is an endoplasmic reticulum chaperone that facilitates the folding and assembly of proteins and regulates the unfolded protein response pathway. GRP78 has a role in survival of cancer and metastasis and cell-surface associated GRP78 (sGRP78) is expressed on cancer cells but not in normal cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInnate lymphoid cells (ILCs) are the most recently described group of lymphoid subpopulations. These tissue-resident cells display a heterogeneity resembling that observed on different groups of T cells, hence their categorization as cytotoxic NK cells and helper ILCs type 1, 2 and 3. Each one of these groups is highly diverse and expresses different markers in a context-dependent manner.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn cutaneous T cell lymphoma (CTCL), a dominant Th2 profile associated with disease progression has been proposed. Moreover, although the production and regulation of IL-4 expression during the early stages of the disease may have important implications in later stages, these processes are poorly understood. Here, we demonstrate the presence of TOX CD4 T cells that produce IL-4 in early-stage skin lesions of CTCL patients and reveal a complex mechanism by which the NLRP3 receptor promotes a Th2 response by controlling IL-4 production.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTissue-resident innate lymphoid cells (ILCs) help sustain barrier function and respond to local signals. ILCs are traditionally classified as ILC1, ILC2 or ILC3 on the basis of their expression of specific transcription factors and cytokines. In the skin, disease-specific production of ILC3-associated cytokines interleukin (IL)-17 and IL-22 in response to IL-23 signalling contributes to dermal inflammation in psoriasis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: This study group has previously identified IL-9-producing mucosal mast cell (MMC9) as the primary source of IL-9 to drive intestinal mastocytosis and experimental IgE-mediated food allergy. However, the molecular mechanisms that regulate the expansion of MMC9s remain unknown.
Objectives: This study hypothesized that IL-4 regulates MMC9 development and MMC9-dependent experimental IgE-mediated food allergy.
T17 cells exemplify environmental immune adaptation: they can acquire both a pathogenic and an anti-inflammatory fate. However, it is not known whether the anti-inflammatory fate is merely a vestigial trait, or whether it serves to preserve the integrity of the host tissues. Here we show that the capacity of T17 cells to acquire an anti-inflammatory fate is necessary to sustain immunological tolerance, yet it impairs immune protection against S.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGeneration of allelic gene reporter mice has provided a powerful tool to study gene function in vivo. In conjunction with imaging technologies, reporter mouse models facilitate studies of cell lineage tracing, live cell imaging, and gene expression in the context of diseases. Although there are several advantages to using reporter mice, caution is important to ensure the fidelity of the reporter protein representing the gene of interest.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAdaptive immunity provides life-long protection by generating central and effector memory T cells and the most recently described tissue resident memory T (T) cells. However, the cellular origin of CD4 T cells and their contribution to host defense remain elusive. Using IL-17A tracking-fate mouse models, we found that a significant fraction of lung CD4 T cells derive from IL-17A-producing effector (T17) cells following immunization with heat-killed Klebsiella pneumonia (Kp).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAs current levels of antimicrobial resistance are alarming, the World Health Organization urged the development of new antimicrobials to fight infections produced by multidrug resistant bacteria. Antibiotics impose severe selective pressure for the development of resistance, and currently bacteria resistant to all of them exist. In this review, we discuss the release and development of new antibacterial drugs and their properties as well as the current advances in the development of alternative approaches to combat bacterial infections, including the repurposing of drugs, anti-virulence therapies, the use of photosensitizers, phage therapy, and immunotherapies, with an emphasis on what is currently known about the possible development of bacterial resistance against them.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt J Antimicrob Agents
December 2018
Early life stress (ELS) affects hippocampal neurogenesis, increases depressive-like behavior, and causes mild metabolic imbalance in early adulthood (2 months). However, whether these effects worsen in mid life remains unclear. To test whether age-dependent effects of ELS on hippocampal neurogenesis are related to deficient hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis feedback that causes increased comorbidity of depression and metabolic risk, we evaluated the effects of periodic maternal separation (MS180) in young (4-months-old) and middle-aged (10-months-old) adult rats.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOver the years, the study of gene function during development involved the implementation of sophisticated transgenic strategies to visualize how organisms change during their lifetime. These strategies are diverse and extremely useful and allowed the discovery of some of the fundamental mechanisms governing organism's development. Such strategies can be time-consuming, in some cases expensive, and require complex infrastructure.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTissue repair is a subset of a broad repertoire of interleukin-4 (IL-4)- and IL-13-dependent host responses during helminth infection. Here we show that IL-4 or IL-13 alone was not sufficient, but IL-4 or IL-13 together with apoptotic cells induced the tissue repair program in macrophages. Genetic ablation of sensors of apoptotic cells impaired the proliferation of tissue-resident macrophages and the induction of anti-inflammatory and tissue repair genes in the lungs after helminth infection or in the gut after induction of colitis.
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