International Immunology, Vol. 15, No. 3, pp. 393-402,
March 2003
© 2003 Japanese Society for Immunology
FEATURED ARTICLE OF THE MONTH |
Expression of recombination-activating gene in mature peripheral T cells in Peyer’s patch
1 Laboratory for Immune Regulation, RIKEN Research Center for Allergy and Immunology, and Department of Molecular Immunology, and 2 Department of Molecular Embryology, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba University, Chiba 260-8670, Japan 3 Department of Immunology, National Institute of Infectious Diseases Tokyo 162-8640, Japan
Correspondence to: M. Taniguchi, Department of Molecular Immunology, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba University, 1-8-1 Inohana, Chuo-ku, Chiba 260-8670, Japan. E-mail: taniguti{at}med.m.chiba-u.ac.jp
Transmitting editor: M. Miyasaka
Recombination-activating gene (RAG) 1 and 2 are essential for the gene rearrangement of antigen receptors of both T and B cells. To investigate RAG gene expression in peripheral lymphoid organs other than the thymus and bone marrow, we established mice in which a green fluorescent protein (GFP) gene is knocked-in the RAG2 gene locus (RAG2-GFP mice). In the thymus and bone marrow of heterozygous RAG2-GFP mice, as expected, GFP expression was detected in the appropriate stages of developing T and B cells. Interestingly, only a fraction of Thy-1.2+ cells in the Peyer’s patch were found to be GFP+ amongst the peripheral lymphoid organs. The GFP+ cells expressed high levels of surface TCRß and CD3, suggesting mature T cells with rearranged TCR
ß. However, they showed activated/memory phenotypes, i.e. CD45RBlow, CD69high, CD44high and CD62Llow, and belonged to a CD4+CD8+ population expressing c-kit, IL-7R and pT characteristic of immature developing lymphocytes. Moreover, RAG+ Peyer’s patch T cells seem to be of thymic origin as judged by their expression of CD8ß. These results show that there exists a fraction of mature T cells expressing RAG genes in the Peyer’s patch, implying a potential for a secondary rearrangement of TCR in extrathymic tissues.
Keywords: green fluorescent protein, knock-in mice, RAG2, TCR rearrangement
CiteULike 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us What's this?
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|
 |
|
  D. Zehn, M. J. Bevan, and P. J. Fink Cutting Edge: TCR Revision Affects Predominantly Foxp3 Cells and Skews Them toward the Th17 Lineage J. Immunol., November 1, 2007; 179(9): 5653 - 5657. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
C. J. Cooper, G. L. Turk, M. Sun, A. G. Farr, and P. J. Fink Cutting Edge: TCR Revision Occurs in Germinal Centers J. Immunol., December 1, 2004; 173(11): 6532 - 6536. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|