Intestinal CD103+ dendritic cells are key players in the innate immune control of Cryptosporidium parvum infection in neonatal mice.

ABSTRACT: Cryptosporidium parvum is a zoonotic protozoan parasite found worldwide, that develops only in the gastrointestinal epithelium and causes profuse diarrhea. Using a mouse model of C. parvum infection, we demonstrated by conditional depletion of CD11c+ cells that these cells are essential for the control of the infection both in neonates and adults. Neonates are highly susceptible to C. parvum but the infection is self-limited, whereas adults are resistant unless immunocompromised. We investigated the contribution of DC to the age-dependent susceptibility to infection. We found that neonates presented a marked deficit in intestinal CD103+ DC during the first weeks of life, before weaning, due to weak production of chemokines by neonatal intestinal epithelial cells (IEC). Increasing the numbe

SUBMITTER: Lantier L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3868524 | biostudies-literature | 2013

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature