Project description:In Multiple Sclerosis, the pathological interaction of autoreactive helper T (TH) cells with mononuclear phagocytes in the central nervous system (CNS) drives initiation and maintenance of chronic neuroinflammation. Herein, we found that intrathecal transplantation of neural stem cells (NPCs) in mice with experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) impairs the accumulation of inflammatory monocyte-derived dendritic cells (moDCs) in the CNS leading to improved clinical outcome. NPCs treatment reduced in the CNS IL-23, IL-1 and TNF-α, cytokines required for terminal differentiation of TH cells and accordingly GM-CSF-producing pathogenic TH cells. In vivo and in vitro transcriptome analyses disclosed that NPC secreted factors induce an inhibition of DC differentiation and maturation, favoring a fate switch towards an anti-inflammatory phenotype. We identified TGF-β2 as the crucial mediator of NPC immunomodulation: TGFβ2 knockout NPCs transplanted in EAE are ineffective in impairing moDC accumulation within the CNS and fail to drive clinical improvement. This study provides evidence that intrathecally injected NPCs interfere with CNS-compartmentalized inflammation of the effector phase of EAE, reprogramming, through the secretion of TGF-β2, inflammatory monocyte-derived DCs towards anti-inflammatory myeloid cells.
Project description:The cytokine transforming growth factor-B (TGF-B) regulates development and homeostasis of several tissue-resident macrophage populations, including microglia. TGF-B is not critical for microglia survival, but is required for the maintenance of the microglia-specific homeostatic gene signature. Under defined host conditions circulating monocytes can compete for the microglial niche and give rise to long-lived monocyte-derived macrophages residing in the central nervous system (CNS). Whether monocytes require TGF-B for colonization of the microglial niche and maintenance of CNS integrity is unknown. We found that abrogation of TGF-B signaling in CX3CR1+ monocyte-derived macrophages led to rapid onset of a progressive and fatal demyelinating motor disease characterized by myelin-laden giant macrophages throughout the spinal cord. The devastating motor disease that developed in TGF-BR2-deficient chimeras indicated that in the absence of TGF-B signaling the CNS environment licenses monocyte-derived macrophages for tissue damage. We therefore addressed how the gene expression signature of CNS macrophages was controlled by TGF-B signaling. We thus sorted TGF-BR2-deficient monocyte-derived macrophages from animals with ongoing motor disease and from their wildtype littermate counterparts. For comparison we sorted wild-type and TGF-BR2-deficient microglia and performed RNA sequencing for all four groups. Tgfbr2-deficient macrophages were characterized by high expression of genes encoding proteins involved in antigen presentation, inflammation and phagocytosis. TGF-B is thus crucial for the functional integration of monocytes into the CNS microenvironment.
Project description:Aberrant activation of TGF-β2 plays an important role in the pathogenesis of adenomyosis. We used microarrays to detail the machanism underlying aberrant activation of TGF-β2 in adenomyosis
Project description:Exercise improves health and well-being across diverse organ systems, and elucidating mechanisms underlying the beneficial effects of exercise on health can lead to new therapies for disease. We find that exercise training in humans causes profound changes in subcutaneous adipose tissue (scWAT) gene expression, including genes encoding secreted proteins. In addition, we used our previously published microarray dataset derived from scWAT from mice housed in static cages (sedentary controls) or mice housed in cages with running wheels for 11 days. Genes that were significantly changed by exercise training in humans and mice were further selected by annotation for Extracellular Space in Gene Ontology. Of these genes, the most significantly correlated with the total wheel running distance in the trained mice was Tgfb2. We validated that exercise training increased TGFB2 mRNA in scWAT of human subjects using RT-qPCR. This led us to hypothesize that TGF-β2 is an exercise-induced adipokine. To determine the therapeutic potential and mechanism for increased TGF-β2, we investigated mouse models of exercise training and obesity. Our findings indicate that exercise training improves metabolism through inter-organ communication with fat via a TGF-β2 signaling, providing a novel mechanism for counteracting metabolic disease.
Project description:CNS autoimmunity is induced by autoreactive T cells reactive against CNS antigen. However how these T cells become able to transgress the blood brain barrier is not CNS autoimmunity is induced by autoreactive T cells reactive against CNS antigen. Here a gene expression profile of the pathogenic T cells in different functional states was performed. These studies were performed in a classical model of multiple sclerosis, experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis in Lewis rats induced by transfer of CD4+myelin basic protein specific T cells. We found that on their way to the CNS T cells fundamentally reprogram their gene expression profile, by down-regulating their activation program and up-regulating cell locomotion molecules. Total RNA extracted from ex vitro myelin specific T cells (blasts and resting state, day 2 and 7 after antigen challenge respectively) or isolated from the spleen (3 days p.t.) was used to perform a genome-wide transcriptional profiling assay (Rat Genome 230, Affymetrix)-
Project description:The epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is overexpressed in approximately 90% of head and neck squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCC), and molecularly targeted therapy against the EGFR with the monoclonal antibody cetuximab modestly increases overall survival in head and neck cancer patients. We hypothesize that co-signaling through additional pathways limits the efficacy of cetuximab and EGFR-specific tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) in the clinical treatment of HNSCC. Analysis of gene expression changes in HNSCC cell lines treated 4 days with TKIs targeting EGFR and/or fibroblast growth factor receptors (FGFRs) identified transforming growth factor beta 2 (TGF-β2) induction in the three cell lines tested. Measurement of TGF-β2 mRNA validated this observation and extended it to additional cell lines. Moreover, TGF-β2 mRNA was increased in primary patient HNSCC xenografts treated for 4 weeks with cetuximab, demonstrating in vivo relevance of these findings. Functional genomics analyses with shRNA libraries identified TGF-β2 and TGF-β receptors (TGFβRs) as synthetic lethal genes in the context of TKI treatment. Further, direct RNAi-mediated silencing of TGF-β2 inhibited cell growth, both alone and in combination with TKIs. Also, a pharmacological TGFβRI inhibitor similarly inhibited basal growth and enhanced TKI efficacy. In summary, the studies support a TGF-β2-TGFβR pathway as a TKI-inducible growth pathway in HNSCC that limits efficacy of EGFR-specific inhibitors.
Project description:CNS autoimmunity is induced by autoreactive T cells reactive against CNS antigen. However how these T cells become able to transgress the blood brain barrier is not CNS autoimmunity is induced by autoreactive T cells reactive against CNS antigen. Here a gene expression profile of the pathogenic T cells in different functional states was performed. These studies were performed in a classical model of multiple sclerosis, experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis in Lewis rats induced by transfer of CD4+myelin basic protein specific T cells. We found that on their way to the CNS T cells fundamentally reprogram their gene expression profile, by down-regulating their activation program and up-regulating cell locomotion molecules.
Project description:m6A-mRNA&lncRNA Epitranscriptomic Microarray of primary mouse RPE cells comparing control untreated RPE cells with RPE cells treated with TGF-β2 at a concentration of 10 ng/ml. The goal was to determine the effects of RNA m6a methylation on primary mouse RPE cells undergoing epithelial-mesenchymal transition induced by TGF-β2.
Project description:In this national Phase I dose-escalation study the safety and tolerability of AP 12009 is evaluated in adult patients with advanced tumors known to overproduce TGF-β2, who are not or no longer amenable to established therapies.
Project description:The study objectives were to 1) determine mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) surface expression of major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class I and transcriptome-wide gene expression changes following IL-1β + TGF-β2 dual licensing and 2) evaluate if IL-1β + TGF-β2 dual licensed MSCs had greater ability to positively modulate tenocyte function compared to naïve MSCs.