scholarly journals Peripheral blood mononuclear cells preferentially activate 11-oxygenated androgens

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lina Schiffer ◽  
Alicia Bossey ◽  
Angela E Taylor ◽  
Ildem Akerman ◽  
Dagmar Scheel-Toellner ◽  
...  

AbstractContextAndrogens are important modulators of immune cell function impacting proliferation, differentiation and cytokine production. The local generation of active androgens from circulating androgen precursors is an important mediator of androgen action in peripheral androgen target cells or tissue.ObjectiveTo characterize the activation of classic and 11-oxygenated androgens in human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs).MethodsPBMCs were isolated from healthy male donors and incubated ex vivo with precursors and active androgens of the classic and 11-oxygenated androgen pathways. Steroids were quantified by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry. The expression of genes encoding steroid-metabolizing enzymes was assessed by quantitative PCR.ResultsPBMCs generated 8-fold higher amounts of the active 11-oxygenated androgen 11-ketotestosterone than the classic androgen testosterone from their respective precursors. We identified the enzyme AKR1C3 as the major reductive 17β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase in PBMCs responsible for both conversions and found that within the PBMC compartment natural killer cells are the major site of AKRC13 expression and activity. Steroid 5α-reductase type 1 catalyzed the 5α-reduction of classic but not 11-oxygenated androgens in PBMCs. Lag time prior to the separation of cellular components from whole blood increased 11KT serum concentrations in a time-dependent fashion, with significant increases detected from two hours after blood collection.Conclusions11-oxygenated androgens are the preferred substrates for androgen activation by AKR1C3 in PBMCs, primarily conveyed by natural killer cell AKR1C3 activity, yielding 11KT the major active androgen in PBMCs. Androgen metabolism by PBMCs can affect the measurement results of serum 11-ketotestosterone concentrations, if samples are not separated in a timely fashion.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tao Huang ◽  
Jun Zhang ◽  
Wujian Ke ◽  
Xiaohui Zhang ◽  
Wentao Chen ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Treponema pallidum ( T. pallidum ) infection evokes significant immune responses, resulting in tissue damage. The immune mechanism underlying T. pallidum infection is still unclear, although microRNAs (miRNAs) have been shown to influence immune cell function and, consequently, the generation of antibody responses during other microbe infections. However, these mechanisms are unknown for T. pallidum . Methods In this study, we performed a comprehensive analysis of differentially expressed miRNAs in healthy individuals, untreated patients with syphilis, patients in the serofast state, and serologically cured patients. miRNAs were profiled from the peripheral blood of patients obtained at the time of serological diagnosis. Then, both the target sequence analysis of these different miRNAs and pathway analysis were performed to identify important immune and cell signaling pathways. Quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was performed for microRNA analysis. Results A total of 89 differentially regulated miRNAs were identified. Following RT-qPCR confirmation, three miRNAs (hsa-miR-195-5p, hsa-miR-223-3p, hsa-miR-589-3p) showed significant differences in the serofast and serologically cured states ( P <0.05). One miRNA (hsa-miR-195-5p) showed significant differences between untreated patients and healthy individuals. Conclusions This is the first study of miRNA expression differences in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) in different stages of T. pallium infection. Our study suggests that the combination of three miRNAs has great potential to serve as a non-invasive biomarker of T. pallium infections, which will facilitate better diagnosis and treatment of T. pallium infections.


1995 ◽  
Vol 132 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mónica Marazuela ◽  
Juan A Vargas ◽  
Melchor Alvarez-Mon ◽  
Fernando Albarrán ◽  
Tomás Lucas ◽  
...  

Marazuela M, Vargas JA, Alvarez-Mon M, Albarrán F, Lucas T, Durántez A. Impaired natural killer cytotoxicity in peripheral blood mononuclear cells in Graves' disease. Eur J Endocrinol 1995;132:175–80. ISSN 0804–4643 We studied the natural killer (NK) activity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) in patients with Graves' disease (GD). Peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 20 untreated hyperthyroid patients with GD showed a significantly reduced NK activity against 51 Cr-labeled K562 cells (33.9 ± 15.9%), while in 32 euthyroid patients under antithyroid drug therapy, NK activity was similar to that of controls (46.9 ± 17.3 and 49.9 ± 20.2%, respectively). Furthermore, normalization of thyroid function with antithyroid drugs was associated with a significant increase and normalization of NK activity during the follow-up of nine GD patients (from 29.2 ± 17.9 to 48.1 ± 16.5%). This phenomenon could not be ascribed to a defective number of NK cells because the amounts of CD56 + and CD16 + cells in PBMC from both hyperthyroid and euthyroid GD patients were within normal ranges. Natural killer activity of PBMC from patients with toxic multinodular goiter was similar to that of normal controls (45 ± 12.8 to 49.9 ± 20%). No correlation was found between natural killer activity and serum levels of free thyroxine, TSH-inhibitory immunoglobulins, thyroidal antibodies to thryoglobulin and thyroidal microsomal antigen, dose or duration of antithyroid drug therapy. Natural killer activity from both controls and GD patients was enhanced in vitro by addition of recombinant interleukin 2 (IL-2), reaching control levels in hyperthyroid patients. These abnormalities were not associated with a defective IL-2 production by T cells, nor with a decreased IL-2R expression. We conclude that in untreated Graves' disease there is a decrease in NK cell activity in PBMC, probably dependent on the autoimmune process. Possible biological and clinical implications are discussed. Monica Marazuela, Hospital de la Princesa, c/Diego de Léon 62, Madrid 28006, Spain


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xinru Qiu ◽  
Jiang Li ◽  
Jeff Bonenfant ◽  
Lukasz Jaroszewski ◽  
Walter Klein ◽  
...  

AbstractSystemic infections, especially in patients with chronic diseases, result in sepsis: an explosive, uncoordinated immune response that can lead to multisystem organ failure with a high mortality rate. Sepsis survivors and non-survivors oftentimes have similar clinical phenotypes or sepsis biomarker expression upon diagnosis, suggesting that the dynamics of sepsis in the critical early stage may have an impact on these opposite outcomes. To investigate this, we designed a within-subject study of patients with systemic gram-negative bacterial sepsis with surviving and fatal outcomes and performed single-cell transcriptomic analyses of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) collected during the critical period between sepsis recognition and 6 hours. We observed that the largest sepsis-induced expression changes over time in surviving versus fatal sepsis were in CD14+ monocytes, including gene signatures previously reported for sepsis outcomes. We further identify changes in the metabolic pathways of both monocytes and platelets, the emergence of erythroid precursors, and T cell exhaustion signatures, with the most extreme differences occurring between the non-sepsis control and the sepsis non-survivor. Our single-cell observations are consistent with trends from public datasets but also reveal specific effects in individual immune cell populations, which change within hours. In conclusion, this pilot study provides the first single-cell results with a repeated measures design in sepsis to analyze the temporal changes in the immune cell population behavior in surviving or fatal sepsis. These findings indicate that tracking temporal expression changes in specific cell-types could lead to more accurate predictions of sepsis outcomes. We also identify molecular pathways that could be therapeutically controlled to improve the sepsis trajectory toward better outcomes.Summary sentenceSingle cell transcriptomics of peripheral blood mononuclear cells in surviving and fatal sepsis reveal inflammatory and metabolic pathways that change within hours of sepsis recognition.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prakash Thapa ◽  
Pramod Nehete ◽  
Hong He ◽  
Bharti Nehete ◽  
Stephanie J. Buchl ◽  
...  

AbstractNatural killer T (NKT) cells are innate immune cells that are responsible for the first line of antiviral defense, through crosstalk with downstream antigen-presenting cells, natural killer cells, and adaptive immune cells. Previous studies have indicated that NKT cell function is severely impaired in patients with chronic HIV-1 infection. It was reported that alpha-galactosylceramide, a potent agonist antigen for NKT cells, failed to trigger the expansion of NKT cells, or the production of anti-viral cytokines by NKT cells from HIV-1 infected patients in an in vitro assay, in which peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were cultured in the presence of alpha-galactosylceramide. In this study, we stimulated banked peripheral blood mononuclear cells from HIV-1-infected patients with dendritic cells (DC) generated ex vivo and loaded with alpha-galactosylceramide. The results showed that NKT cells were expanded in HIV infected subjects except in patients with advanced AIDS. Expanded NKT cells were capable of producing antiviral cytokines. Our results indicate that NKT cells in HIV infected individuals are potential targets for therapeutic intervention.


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