TLR7激动剂对P.y 17XNL感染BALB/c小鼠免疫调节效应的影响

宿主抗疟保护性免疫应答的水平和强度与疟疾预后关系密切,当疟原虫侵袭宿主时,TLRs向机体传达病原体入侵信息,激活免疫系统。采用TLR7激动剂处理P.y 17XNL感染的BALB/c小鼠,通过FACS和ELISA检测DC亚群(mDC和pDC)、CD4~+ T细胞亚群(Th1、Th2、Tfh和Treg)和细胞因子(IFN-γ、IL-4、IL-21和IL-10)的水平,明确TLR7通过DC调控宿主应答的免疫机制。结果显示,TLR7激动剂能够促进DC亚群数量的增加,同时也提高Th1和Tfh细胞分化,并显著增加IFN-γ分泌水平。因此,TLR7激动剂通过诱导DC活化,促进Th1型免疫应答降低原虫血症水平,在疟疾感染过程中发挥保护性免疫作用。     

钵水母水螅体横裂诱发条件及调控机制研究进展

横裂是水螅体世代向水母体世代转变的重要阶段.对水螅体横裂诱发条件及调控分子机制的研究不仅对水母爆发生态学和水母人工繁育具有重要意义,而且对比较研究两栖类、昆虫以及刺胞动物等具有复杂生活史生物的变态分子机制起源也具有很好的理论价值.现有研究表明,诱发水螅体横裂的自然环境因素有温度、光照、盐度和共生虫黄藻等,不同门类水母的横裂方式以及环境诱导因素各不相同.能够诱导水螅体横裂的化学因素有吲哚类化合物、9-顺式维甲酸、碘元素和过氧化氢等,其中吲哚类化合物对绝大多数水母水螅体都有诱导作用.尽管水螅体横裂的分子机制尚未明晰,但对海月水母的研究表明,RxR信号通路以及一种横裂诱导激素前体假定蛋白CL390在水母横裂过程中起着重要的作用,提示水母变态分子机制与两栖类和昆虫在分子水平上存在一定程度的共性.     

5-HT和DA对虾蟹打斗行为影响的研究进展

5-羟色胺(5-HT)和多巴胺(DA)是两种神经递质,可与众多不同类型的受体结合发挥多种重要的生理功能.现已证明其广泛分布于多种动物的不同组织中,在动物的打斗行为活动中起着重要的调节作用.目前,在虾蟹中已被报道的5-HT受体主要有5种,分别是5-HT1A、5-HT1B、5HT2A、5HT2B和5-HT7;DA受体主要为DA1A、DA1B、DA2和DA4.5-HT和DA及其受体分布存在明显的种属和组织特异性.5-HT和DA参于了虾蟹打斗行为的调节过程并有不同的调节机理.5-HT可以调节环磷酸腺苷(cAMP)或高血糖激素(CHH)的释放,促进或抑制虾蟹打斗行为;而DA同样能够通过调节cAMP及COMT等物质的释放来调节虾蟹打斗行为.     

肠道微生物与1型糖尿病的相关性研究

1型糖尿病(type 1 diabetes, T1D)是一种自身免疫性疾病,越来越多的证据支持肠道菌群是T1D发病的重要因素。在T1D发生前,观察到肠道通透性发生改变,使抗原透过肠黏膜进而攻击胰岛β细胞。患有T1D宿主体内的肠道微生物也与健康宿主的微生物有别,其调节性T细胞、Toll样受体(toll-like receptor, TLR)、丁酸、粘蛋白、胰高血糖素样肽-1(glucagon-likepeptide1,GLP-1)等可能与T1D有关。尽管通过细菌定植促进自身免疫的机制在糖尿病动物模型中虽已发现,但有些问题目前尚不清楚。现就肠道黏膜通透性与T1D的关系、宿主体内微生物组成的变化、肠道微生物与T1D的相关性作一阐述。     

cxcr2基因修饰小鼠骨髓间充质干细胞的构建与鉴定

目的构建小鼠CXC型趋化因子受体2(CXCR2)基因cxcr2过表达的骨髓间充质干细胞(Bone marrow mes-enchymal stem cell,BMSC)并进行鉴定。方法全骨髓贴壁法分离培养小鼠BMSC,采用流式细胞术检测干细胞抗原1(stem cell antigen-1,SCA-1)、CD44、CD43、CD45、IA/IE表达率,并诱导成骨分化。以含有小鼠cxcr2的质粒为模版进行PCR扩增,将获得的cxcr2克隆到慢病毒载体,命名为p Lenti-cxcr2-GZ;将其与慢病毒包装质粒共转染HEK-293T细胞,收获慢病毒后,通过离心法感染BMSC,经过1μg/mL zeocin压力选择建立了稳定表达CXCR2的小鼠BMSC(CXCR2-BMSC)。采用流式细胞术和RT-PCR分别检测其CXCR2蛋白和m RNA表达水平,Transwell趋化实验检测其迁移能力。结果 90%以上的第3代BMSC表达CD44、SCA-1,几乎不表达IA/IE、CD34、CD45,且成功诱导成骨分化。菌液PCR、质粒双酶切后,琼脂糖凝胶电泳鉴定结果得到特异、大小正确的条带及测序鉴定正确,表明成功构建了p Lenti-cxcr2-GZ表达质粒。流式细胞术和RT-PCR结果显示,CXCR2-BMSC的CXCR2蛋白和m RNA表达水平均明显高于对照组BMSC,差异有统计学意义(P<0.001)。Transwell结果显示,CXCR2-BMSC迁移能力高于对照组BMSC,差异有统计学意义(P<0.01)。结论利用慢病毒系统成功构建了稳定表达CXCR2的BM-SC,cxcr2基因修饰BMSC后可明显增加BMSC的迁移能力。     

孕烷X受体配体结合结构域蛋白晶体的X线衍射结构解析

目的:利用X线衍射技术解析孕烷X受体(PXR)配体结合结构域(LBD)蛋白晶体的3维结构。方法:对PXR蛋白LBD(130~434氨基酸残基)序列进行密码子优化并化学合成后克隆至pRSFDuet-1表达载体,再将载体导入大肠杆菌BL21(DE3),对PXR-LBD蛋白进行原核表达与分离纯化;采用晶体筛选试剂盒筛选蛋白结晶条件,采用悬滴法获得目标蛋白的晶体;对获得的蛋白晶体进行X线晶体衍射检测,并收集相关数据建立PXR-LBD的三维结构。结果:获得了PXR-LBD的高质量晶体并利用X线衍射解析了该蛋白质晶体的结构数据,使用Phenix.refine软件和COOT软件等对结构进行修正,最终获得了高分辨率的3维结构数据。结论:完成了孕烷X受体配体结合结构域蛋白晶体的X线衍射结构解析,为研究和开发PXR相关药物奠定了基础。     

Delineation of critical amino acids in activation function 1 of progesterone receptor for recruitment of transcription coregulators

The activation functions AF1 and AF2 of nuclear receptors mediate the recruitment of coregulators in gene regulation. AF1 is mapped to the highly variable and intrinsically unstructured N terminal domain and AF2 lies in the conserved ligand binding domain. The unstructured nature of AF1 offers structural plasticity and hence functional versatility in gene regulation. However, little is known about the key functional residues of AF1 that mediates its interaction with coregulators. This study focuses on the progesterone receptor (PR) and reports the identification of K464, K481 and R492 (KKR) as the key functional residues of PR AF1. The KKR are monomethylated and function cooperatively. The combined mutations of KKR to QQQ render PR isoform B (PRB) hyperactive, whereas KKR to FFF mutations abolishes as much as 80% of PR activity. Furthermore, the hyperactive QQQ mutation rescues the loss of PR activity due to E911A mutation in AF2. The study also finds that the magnitudes of the mutational effect differ in different cell types as a result of differential effects on the functional interaction with coregulators. Furthermore, KKR provides the interface for AF1 to physically interact with p300 and SRC-1, and with AF2 at E911. Intriguingly, the inactive FFF mutant interacts strikingly stronger with both SRC-1 and AF2 than wt PRB. We propose a tripartite model to describe the dynamic interactions between AF1, AF2 and SRC-1 with KKR of AF1 and E911 of AF2 as the interface. An overly stable interaction would hamper the dynamics of disassembly of the receptor complex.     

Functional mimetic of the G-protein coupled receptor CXCR4 on a soluble antibody scaffold

G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) constitute major drug targets due to their involvement in critical biological functions and pathophysiological disorders. The leading challenge in their structural and functional characterization has been the need for a lipid environment to accommodate their hydrophobic cores. Here, we report an antibody scaffold mimetic (ASM) platform where we have recapitulated the extracellular functional domains of the GPCR, C-X-C chemokine receptor 4 (CXCR4) on a soluble antibody framework. The engineered ASM molecule can accommodate the N-terminal loop and all three extracellular loops of CXCR4. These extracellular features are important players in ligand recruitment and interaction for allostery and signal transduction. Our study shows that ASM^CXCR4 can be recognized by the anti-CXCR4 antibodies, MEDI3185, 2B11, and 12G5, and that ASM^CXCR4 can bind the HIV-1 glycoprotein ligand gp120, and the natural chemokine ligand SDF-1α. Further, we show that ASM^CXCR4 can competitively inhibit the SDF-1α signaling pathway, and be used as an immunogen to generate CXCR4-specific antibodies. This platform will be useful in the study of GPCR biology in a soluble receptor context for evaluating its extracellular ligand interactions.     

Influence of N-glycosylation on effector functions and thermal stability of glycoengineered IgG1 monoclonal antibody with homogeneous glycoforms

Glycosylation of the conserved asparagine residue in each heavy chain of IgG in the CH2 domain is known as N-glycosylation. It is one of the most common post-translational modifications and important critical quality attributes of monoclonal antibody (mAb) therapeutics. Various studies have demonstrated the effects of the Fc N-glycosylation on safety, Fc effector functions, and pharmacokinetics, both dependent and independent of neonatal Fc receptor (FcRn) pathway. However, separation of various glycoforms to investigate the biological and functional relevance of glycosylation is a major challenge, and existing studies often discuss the overall impact of N-glycans, without considering the individual contributions of each glycoform when evaluating mAbs with highly heterogeneous distributions. In this study, chemoenzymatic glycoengineering incorporating an endo-β-N-acetylglucosaminidase (ENGase) EndoS2 and its mutant with transglycosylation activity was used to generate mAb glycoforms with highly homogeneous and well-defined N-glycans to better understand and precisely evaluate the effect of each N-glycan structure on Fc effector functions and protein stability. We demonstrated that the core fucosylation, non-reducing terminal galactosylation, sialylation, and mannosylation of IgG1 mAb N-glycans impact not only on FcγRIIIa binding, antibody-dependent cell-mediated cytotoxicity, and C1q binding, but also FcRn binding, thermal stability and propensity for protein aggregation.     

Improved monovalent TNF receptor 1-selective inhibitor with novel heterodimerizing Fc

The development of alternative therapeutic strategies to tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-blocking antibodies for the treatment of inflammatory diseases has generated increasing interest. In particular, selective inhibition of TNF receptor 1 (TNFR1) promises a more precise intervention, tackling only the pro-inflammatory responses mediated by TNF while leaving regenerative and pro-survival signals transduced by TNFR2 untouched. We recently generated a monovalent anti-TNFR1 antibody fragment (Fab 13.7) as an efficient inhibitor of TNFR1. To improve the pharmacokinetic properties of Fab 13.7, the variable domains of the heavy and light chains were fused to the N-termini of newly generated heterodimerizing Fc chains. This novel Fc heterodimerization technology, designated “Fc-one/kappa” (Fc1κ) is based on interspersed constant Ig domains substituting the CH3 domains of a γ1 Fc. The interspersed immunoglobulin (Ig) domains originate from the per se heterodimerizing constant CH1 and CLκ domains and contain sequence stretches of an IgG1 CH3 domain, destined to enable interaction with the neonatal Fc receptor, and thus promote extended serum half-life. The resulting monovalent Fv-Fc1κ fusion protein (Atrosimab) retained strong binding to TNFR1 as determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and quartz crystal microbalance, and potently inhibited TNF-induced activation of TNFR1. Atrosimab lacks agonistic activity for TNFR1 on its own and in the presence of anti-human IgG antibodies and displays clearly improved pharmacokinetic properties.