Insulin-like growth factor-1 receptor RNA expression in hematopoietic stem cell transplanted patients does not correlate with graft-versus-host disease.

In vivo activated T lymphocytes exhibit altered expression of insulin-like growth factor-1 receptor (IGF-1R) compared to the naïve T lymphocyte pool. The objective of this study was to investigate the expression of IGF-1R RNA in CD4 and CD8 positive cells after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) in patients with and without GVHD. For this purpose we isolated RNA from CD4 and CD8 positive cells, sorted with immunomagnetic beads. We used real-time PCR for RNA quantification. We demonstrate a significantly decreased expression of IGF-1R RNA in both CD4 and CD8 positive cells up to 12 months after HSCT. We could not demonstrate a correlation between the IGF-1R RNA expression and T cell activating processes like GVHD, expansion of CD4 or CD8 populations or virus infections.