Amelioration of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis by curcumin treatment through inhibition of IL-17 production.

Experimental autoimmune encephalomylitis (EAE), an animal mode of multiple sclerosis (MS), was previously considered that be mediated by Th1 cells. However, a number of recent studies provided strong evidence that T helper cells that produce IL-17 play a dominant role in the pathogenesis of EAE. Curcumin (1,7-Bis 94-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenyl)-1,6 heptadiene-3, 5-di-one) is a naturally occurring polyphenolic phytochemical isolated from the rhizome of the medicinal plant Curcuma longa. It has been strongly implicated as an anti-inflammatory agent, but the precise mechanisms of its action are largely unknown. In the present study, we have investigated the efficacy and mechanism of curcumin against EAE. The treatment of Lewis rats with curcumin significantly reduced the clinical severity of EAE, and had a dramatic reduction in the number of inflammatory cells infiltration in the spinal cord. The proliferation of the MBP-reaction lymphocyte also was reduced in a curcumin dose-dependent manner. Furthermore, the mRNA expression of the cytokine profiles was assessed by quantitative reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR), revealing the dramatic decrease of IL-17, TGF-beta, IL-6, IL-21, STAT3, and RORgammat expression in curcumin-treated groups and STAT3-phosphorylation also was inhibited. These findings indicated that curcumin amelioration EAE was, to a large extent, due to inhibit differentiation and development of Th17 cells depends on down-regulating expression of IL-6, IL-21, RORgammat signaling and inhibition STAT3-phosphorylation, suggests it is useful in the treatment of MS and other Th17 cell-mediated inflammatory diseases.

Prolongation of rat major histocompatibility complex-compatible cardiac allograft survival during pregnancy.

BACKGROUND: It has been suggested that pregnancy-related hormones play a critical role in mediating selective immune tolerance during pregnancy. An understanding of why a woman's body normally does not reject the fetus is highly relevant to the prevention of transplant rejection. METHODS: The hearts of female inbred F344 rats (RT-1(lvl)) were transplanted into naive Lewis (RT-1(l); nLewis) or pregnant (pLewis; Day 6, 12 and 18 of pregnancy) rats. The mean survival time (MST) of the cardiac allografts between the nLewis and pLewis rats was compared. We determined the rate of proliferation of the T cells isolated from nLewis and pLewis rats in response to concanavalin A (ConA), anti-CD3 and -CD28 antibody and alloantigen stimulation ex vivo. mRNA expression of several cytokines in these T cells was analyzed using quantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). In addition, the effect of estriol on the cardiac allograft was tested. RESULTS: The pLewis rats with transplant on Day 12 of pregnancy had the most significantly prolonged F344 cardiac graft survival (MST 13.3 days) as compared with nLewis recipients (MST 8 days). pLewis T-cell proliferation was stimulated by alloantigen and antibody but ConA was reduced, whereas Th1/Th2 cytokine mRNA profiles in the T cells were similar for nLewis and pLewis rats. Likewise, estriol also significantly prolonged survival of cardiac allografts. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study demonstrate that pregnancy hormones not only appear to play a critical role in maternal acceptance of the fetus, but also have therapeutic potential for prolonging the survival of major histocompatibility complex (MHC)-compatible allografts during pregnancy.

Survival of skin allografts is prolonged in mice with a dominant-negative H-Ras.

Ras is a guanine nucleotide-binding protein that plays a major role in regulating the proliferation of T cells. To investigate the mechanism of the Ras/mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway, one of the downstream signal-transduction pathways of T-cell receptors, in the response to alloantigen, we performed full-thickness skin grafting in the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) incompatible strain BALB/c (H-2Kd) (donor) and T-cell-specific H-Ras dominant-negative (dnRas) transgenic (tg) C57BL/6 (H-2Kb) (recipient) male mice. In vitro and in vivo dnRas tg mouse T-cell proliferation and cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) activity assay were also performed. The median graft survival time in control B6/wild type (wt) mouse allografts was seven days. Conversely, the dnRas tg mouse group exhibited a significant (p<0.01) prolongation of graft survival to 15 days. However, all grafts were eventually rejected after one month. Mixed lymphocyte reaction and popliteal lymph node assay revealed that T-cell proliferation was decreased in response to alloantigen, but CTL activity was not changed in the dnRas tg mice. These results suggested that Ras is essential for peripheral T lymphocytes to respond to allo-MHC antigens, and Ras may be a molecular target for controlling transplant rejection.

Sensitization to enhanced green fluorescence protein minor histocompatibility antigen by gene transduction into dendritic cells and peritoneal exudate macrophages.

Enhanced green fluorescence protein (EGFP) has been widely applied to gene transduction in cellular and molecular biology as a reporter element. When applied to cell transplantation, it raises fundamental issues concerning cell-associated antigens, in particular, a model of minor histocompatibility antigen(s). Although it is well known that immunological behavior of minor histocompatibility antigens mimic tumor associated antigens (TAA), identified genes coding minor histocompatibility antigens are few and far between. Inasmuch as immunity and tolerance to TAA are provided by immunological behavior of minor histocompatibility antigen such as histocompatibility antigen of the Y chromosome, H-Y, it occurs to us that transgenic as well as transduced EGFP provides a useful model system to be applied to tumor immunology. In this respect, genetic modification of specialized antigen-presenting cells (APC), i.e., dendritic cells (DC), such as gene transduction of EGFP into DC, would provide one of the most important strategies in transplantation as well as tumor immunology inasmuch as DC play a key role in initiating primary immune responses, As far as gene transduction into DC is concerned, others have reported that successful gene transduction occurs in DC by adenoviral vector systems. However, our previous studies concerning EGFP transduction into DC suggested that this view should be carefully examined and interpreted. Employing adenoviral and lentiviral vector systems as well as specialized APC of rat DC and peritoneal exudate macrophages (PEM), EGFP-transduced APC were examined to determine whether and to what extent the EGFP-transduced APC were able to sensitize non-transgenic littermates against transgenic EGFP as antigen(s). Thus EGFP-transgenic cardiac isografts were transplanted to non-transgenic littermates and examined to determine if sensitization of non-transgenic littermate recipients with the EGFP-transduced APC was able to reject the test grafts in an accelerated manner. In this study, we examined this and provide further evidence that widely used viral vector systems are unable to transfer the reporter gene EGFP into mature rat DC generated from bone marrow cells (BMC), driven by Flt3/Flk2 ligand and IL-6. Nevertheless, successful gene transduction was obtained by either applying a lentiviral vector system to the developing DC progenitor cells during a long-term culture of rat BMC or by applying an adenoviral vector system to PEM. Thus, successful gene transduction into specialized APC was verified by in vivo priming of non-transgenic littermates with the EGFP-transduced APC, followed by accelerated rejection of EGFP-transgenic cardiac isografts.

A novel chemical compound, NK026680, targets dendritic cells to prolong recipient survival after rat liver grafting.

BACKGROUND: There is great interest in the recently developed immunosuppressant NK026680, which is a derivative of triazolopyrimidine. Its unique chemical structure and action mechanism are completely different from those of conventional immunosuppressants. METHODS: The present study was designed to investigate the effects of NK026680 on rat bone-marrow-derived dendritic cell (BMDC) differentiation and maturation in an in vitro culture system and its applicability in liver transplantation. RESULTS: NK026680 inhibited T-cell proliferation stimulated by alloantigen in a dose-dependent manner, but did not inhibit concanavalin A. The populations of OX6+CD161a cells and CD86+CD161a cells were suppressed in NK026680-treated dendritic cells (DCs). Exposure of DCs to NK026680 downregulated the interleukin (IL)-12 (p40, p35), interferon-gamma mRNA expression and upregulated IL-10, transforming growth factor-beta, in which impaired the ability of DC to stimulate T cell proliferation. Furthermore, oral administration of NK026680 for 14 days significantly prolonged liver allograft survival and limitation of T-cell responses and polarization toward a Th2 cytokine profile. CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrate that NK026680 may have therapeutic potential for preventing allo-rejection in organ transplantation, acting at the step of immune response through inhibiting BMDC differentiation and maturation into potent antigen-presenting cells.