RESUMO
The existence of a functional link between the nervous and immune systems has been well established. The present study was to characterize the expression of p75NTR during thymus regeneration from acute involution induced by cyclophosphamide in the rat. Immunohistochemical and double immunofluorescence analyses demonstrated that expression of the p75NTR was decreased in the thymic medullary epithelial cells and interdigitating dendritic cells during thymus regeneration. The presence of p75NTR protein in extracts from the control and regenerating rat thymus was confirmed by western blot. Furthermore, RT-PCR analysis supported these results by demonstrating that thymic extracts contain p75NTR mRNA at lower levels during thymus regeneration. Thus, our results suggest that the p75NTR located on the thymic medullary epithelial cells and interdigitating dendritic cells could play a role in the development of new T cells to replace the thymocytes damaged during thymus regeneration