LIGHT regulated gene expression in rheumatoid synovial fibroblasts.

Background: Synovial hyperplasia caused by rheumatoid arthritis (RA), an autoimmune inflammatory disease, leads to the destruction of the articular cartilage and bone. A member of the tumor necrosis factor superfamily, Lymphotoxin-related inducible ligand that competes for glycoprotein D binding to herpes virus entry mediator on T cells (LIGHT) has been shown to correlate with the pathogenesis of RA.

Methods: We used cDNA microarray analysis to compare the expression of genes in rheumatoid fibroblast-like synoviocytes with and without LIGHT stimulation.

Results: Significant changes in gene expression (P-values < 0.05 and fold change ≥ 2.0) were associated mainly with biological function categories of glycoprotein, glycosylation site as N-linked, plasma membrane part, integral to plasma membrane, intrinsic to plasma membrane, signal, plasma membrane, signal peptide, alternative splicing, and topological domain as extracellular.

Conclusions: Our results indicate that LIGHT may regulate the expression in RA-FLS of genes which are important in the differentiation of several cell types and in cellular functions.