TAK1 mediates lipopolysaccharide-induced RANTES promoter activation in BV-2 microglial cells.

Lipopolysaccharide (LPS), a part of the outer membrane of gram-negative bacteria activates the expression of the regulated upon activation, normal T cell expressed and secreted (RANTES), which plays an important role in the chemo-attraction of leukocytes during the inflammatory response. Recently, we found that LPS-induced RANTES production is mediated by the activation of NF-kappaB, but, the upstream regulatory mechanism involved in mediating this NF-kappaB activation was unclear. In this study, we investigated signal transducing molecules that mediate LPS-induced RANTES promoter activation and found the followings.

Different sensitivity to nephrotoxic agents and osmotic stress in proximal tubular and collecting duct cell lines derived from transgenic mice.

We established six renal tubular cell lines from definite tubular areas of the kidney of transgenic mice harboring tsSV40 large T-antigen gene. Three are proximal tubular cell lines prepared from the S(1), S(2) and S(3) segments of the proximal tubule and the others are collecting duct cell lines obtained from cortical, outer medullary and inner medullary collecting ducts (CCD, OMCD and IMCD, respectively). To verify the growth properties of these cell lines under different temperature conditions (33 and 39 degrees C), two representative cells were chosen from the proximal tubule (S(1) cells) and from the collecting duct (IMCD cells).