Comparative Pathogenesis of Autoimmune Diabetes in Humans, NOD Mice, and Canines: Has a Valuable Animal Model of Type 1 Diabetes Been Overlooked?

Abstract11-Keto-β-Boswellic acid (KBA) has been shown to prevent infiltration of lymphocytes into pancreatic islets and appearance of peri-insular apoptotic cells in an animal model of autoimmune diabetes caused by injection of Multiple Low Doses of Streptozotocin (MLD-STZ), which is a chemical compound belonging to the class of nitrososureas. The aim of this work was to study whether or not KBA can also prevent/attenuate infiltration of lymphocytes into pancreatic islets and appearance of peri-insular apoptotic cells in an animal model of autoimmune diabetes caused by genetic dysfunction resembling human type 1 diabetes in several important features. Four weeks old female NOD mice received daily i.p. injections of 7.5 mg/kg of KBA over a period of 3 weeks. Compared to 4 weeks old animals there was significant infiltration of lymphocytes (CD3) into pancreatic islets and appearance of peri-insular apoptotic cells in the period between 4 and 7 weeks. During this time plasma glucose dropped significantly and body weight did not increase. As far as pro-inflammatory cytokines are concerned, except a small increase of IFN-γ, there was no change in the blood. In mice that had been treated with KBA between 4 and 7 weeks after birth no significant infiltration of lymphocytes into pancreatic islets and appearance of peri-insular apoptotic cells was observed, when compared to 4 weeks old mice. Moreover, there was no drop of blood glucose and the animals gained body weight. It is concluded that – similar to the model of MLD-STZ-diabetes – also in the NOD mouse model KBA is able to attenuate or even prevent development of insulitis, suggesting that KBA protects islets from autoimmune reaction regardless whether the signal is provided by a chemical compound or by genetic dysfunction. Whether this also holds for human type 1 diabetes remains to be established.

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Replacing murine insulin 1 with human insulin protects NOD mice from diabetes

10.1101/823393 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Colleen M. Elso ◽

Nicholas A. Scott ◽

Lina Mariana ◽

Emma I. Masterman ◽

Andrew P.R. Sutherland ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Beta Cells ◽

Mouse Models ◽

Human Insulin ◽

Murine Model ◽

Pancreatic Beta Cells ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Human Type 1 Diabetes

AbstractType 1, or autoimmune, diabetes is caused by the T-cell mediated destruction of the insulin-producing pancreatic beta cells. Non-obese diabetic (NOD) mice spontaneously develop autoimmune diabetes akin to human type 1 diabetes. For this reason, the NOD mouse has been the preeminent murine model for human type 1 diabetes research for several decades. However, humanized mouse models are highly sought after because they offer both the experimental tractability of a mouse model and the clinical relevance of human-based research. Autoimmune T-cell responses against insulin, and its precursor proinsulin, play central roles in the autoimmune responses against pancreatic beta cells in both humans and NOD mice. As a first step towards developing a murine model of the human autoimmune response against pancreatic beta cells we set out to replace the murine insulin 1 gene (Ins1) with the human insulin gene (INS) using CRISPR/Cas9. Here we describe a NOD mouse strain that expresses human insulin in place of murine insulin 1, referred to as HuPI. HuPI mice express human insulin, and C-peptide, in their serum and pancreata and have normal glucose tolerance. Compared with wild type NOD mice, the incidence of diabetes is much lower in HuPI mice. Only 15-20% of HuPI mice developed diabetes after 300 days, compared to more than 60% of unmodified NOD mice. Immune-cell infiltration into the pancreatic islets of HuPI mice was not detectable at 100 days but was clearly evident by 300 days. This work highlights the feasibility of using CRISPR/Cas9 to create mouse models of human diseases that express proteins pivotal to the human disease. Furthermore, it reveals that even subtle changes in proinsulin protect NOD mice from diabetes.

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Targeting transcriptional coregulator OCA-B/Pou2af1 blocks activated autoreactive T cells in the pancreas and type-1 diabetes

10.1101/2020.02.06.937839 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Heejoo Kim ◽

Jelena Perovanovic ◽

Arvind Shakya ◽

Zuolian Shen ◽

Cody N. German ◽

...

Keyword(s):

T Cells ◽

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

T Cell ◽

Target Genes ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Cell Receptor ◽

Glucose Levels ◽

Transcriptional Coregulator

AbstractThe transcriptional coregulator OCA-B promotes expression of T cell target genes in cases of repeated antigen exposure, a necessary feature of autoimmunity. We hypothesized that T cell-specific OCA-B deletion and pharmacologic OCA-B inhibition would protect mice from autoimmune diabetes. We developed an Ocab conditional allele and backcrossed it onto a diabetes-prone NOD/ShiLtJ strain background. T cell-specific OCA-B loss protected mice from spontaneous disease. Protection was associated with large reductions in islet CD8+ T cell receptor specificities associated with diabetes pathogenesis. CD4+ clones associated with diabetes were present, but associated with anergic phenotypes. The protective effect of OCA-B loss was recapitulated using autoantigen-specific NY8.3 mice, but diminished in monoclonal models specific to artificial or neoantigens. Rationally-designed membrane-penetrating OCA-B peptide inhibitors normalized glucose levels, and reduced T cell infiltration and proinflammatory cytokine expression in newly-diabetic NOD mice. Together, the results indicate that OCA-B is a potent autoimmune regulator and a promising target for pharmacologic inhibition.~40-word summary statement for the online JEM table of contents and alertsKim and colleagues show that OCA-B in T cells is essential for the generation of type-1 diabetes. OCA-B loss leaves the pancreatic lymph nodes largely undisturbed, but associates autoreactive CD4+ T cells in the pancreas with anergy while deleting potentially autoreactive CD8+ T cells.SummaryKim et al. show that loss or inhibition of OCA-B in T cells protects mice from type-1 diabetes.

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Knockout of the Amino Acid Transporter SLC6A19 and Autoimmune Diabetes Incidence in Female Non-Obese Diabetic (NOD) Mice

Metabolites ◽

10.3390/metabo11100665 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (10) ◽

pp. 665

Author(s):

Matthew F. Waters ◽

Viviane Delghingaro-Augusto ◽

Kiran Javed ◽

Jane E. Dahlstrom ◽

Gaetan Burgio ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Amino Acid ◽

Confidence Interval ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Amino Acid Transporter ◽

Diabetes Incidence ◽

Amino Acid Availability ◽

Acid Transporter

High protein feeding has been shown to accelerate the development of type 1 diabetes in female non-obese diabetic (NOD) mice. Here, we investigated whether reducing systemic amino acid availability via knockout of the Slc6a19 gene encoding the system B(0) neutral amino acid transporter AT1 would reduce the incidence or delay the onset of type 1 diabetes in female NOD mice. Slc6a19 gene deficient NOD mice were generated using the CRISPR-Cas9 system which resulted in marked aminoaciduria. The incidence of diabetes by week 30 was 59.5% (22/37) and 69.0% (20/29) in NOD.Slc6a19+/+ and NOD.Slc6a19−/− mice, respectively (hazard ratio 0.77, 95% confidence interval 0.41–1.42; Mantel-Cox log rank test: p = 0.37). The median survival time without diabetes was 28 and 25 weeks for NOD.Slc6a19+/+ and NOD.Slc6a19−/− mice, respectively (ratio 1.1, 95% confidence interval 0.6–2.0). Histological analysis did not show differences in islet number or the degree of insulitis between wild type and Slc6a19 deficient NOD mice. We conclude that Slc6a19 deficiency does not prevent or delay the development of type 1 diabetes in female NOD mice.

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Effective Destruction of Fas-deficient Insulin-producing β Cells in Type 1 Diabetes

Journal of Experimental Medicine ◽

10.1084/jem.20030698 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 198 (7) ◽

pp. 1103-1106 ◽

Cited By ~ 52

Author(s):

Irina Apostolou ◽

Zhenyue Hao ◽

Klaus Rajewsky ◽

Harald von Boehmer

Keyword(s):

T Cells ◽

Cell Death ◽

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Β Cells ◽

Β Cell ◽

Influenza Hemagglutinin ◽

Insulin Promoter

In type 1 diabetes, autoimmune T cells cause destruction of pancreatic β cells by largely unknown mechanism. Previous analyses have shown that β cell destruction is delayed but can occur in perforin-deficient nonobese diabetic (NOD) mice and that Fas-deficient NOD mice do not develop diabetes. However, because of possible pleiotropic functions of Fas, it was not clear whether the Fas receptor was an essential mediator of β cell death in type 1 diabetes. To directly test this hypothesis, we have generated a β cell–specific knockout of the Fas gene in a transgenic model of type 1 autoimmune diabetes in which CD4+ T cells with a transgenic TCR specific for influenza hemagglutinin (HA) are causing diabetes in mice that express HA under control of the rat insulin promoter. Here we show that the Fas-deficient mice develop autoimmune diabetes with slightly accelerated kinetics indicating that Fas-dependent apoptosis of β cells is a dispensable mode of cell death in this disease.

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Peptidylarginine deiminase inhibition prevents diabetes development in NOD mice

10.2337/figshare.13221704 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Ada Admin ◽

Fernanda M. C. Sodré ◽

Samal Bissenova ◽

Ylke Bruggeman ◽

Ronak Tilvawala ◽

...

Keyword(s):

T Cells ◽

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Autoimmune Diseases ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Effector Memory ◽

Cell Reactivity ◽

Diabetes Development ◽

T Cell Reactivity

Protein citrullination plays a role in several autoimmune diseases. Its involvement in murine and human type 1 diabetes has recently been recognized through the discovery of antibodies and T-cell reactivity against citrullinated peptides. In the current study, we demonstrate that systemic inhibition of peptidylarginine deiminases (PADs), the enzymes mediating citrullination, through BB-Cl-amidine treatment, prevents diabetes development in NOD mice. This prevention was associated with reduced levels of citrullination in the pancreas, decreased circulating autoantibody titers against citrullinated GRP78 and reduced spontaneous NETosis of bone marrow-derived neutrophils. Moreover, BB-Cl-amidine treatment induced a shift from Th1 to Th2 cytokines in the serum and an increase in the frequency of regulatory T cells in the blood and spleen. In the pancreas, BB-Cl-amidine treatment preserved insulin production and was associated with a less destructive immune infiltrate, characterized by reduced frequencies of effector memory CD4+ T cells and a modest reduction in the frequency of IFNγ-producing CD4+ and CD8+ T cells. Our results point to a role of citrullination in the pathogenesis of autoimmune diabetes, with PAD inhibition leading to disease prevention through modulation of immune pathways. These findings provide insight in the potential of PAD inhibition for treating autoimmune diseases like type 1 diabetes.

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Peripherally-induced regulatory T cells contribute to the control of autoimmune diabetes

10.1101/199646 ◽

2017 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Cornelia Schuster ◽

Fangzhu Zhao ◽

Stephan Kissler

Keyword(s):

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

T Cell ◽

Pancreatic Beta Cells ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Beta Cell Autoimmunity ◽

Autoimmune Destruction ◽

Treg Function ◽

Distinct Role

AbstractType 1 diabetes (T1D) results from the autoimmune destruction of pancreatic beta cells and is partly caused by deficiencies in the Foxp3+ regulatory T cell (Treg) compartment. Conversely, therapies that increase Treg function can prevent autoimmune diabetes in animal models. The majority of Tregs develop in the thymus (tTregs), but a proportion of Foxp3+ Tregs is generated in the periphery (pTregs) from Foxp3-CD4+ T cell precursors. Whether pTregs play a distinct role in T1D has not yet been explored. We report here that pTregs are a key modifier of disease in the nonobesed diabetic (NOD) mouse model for T1D. We generated NOD mice deficient for the Foxp3 enhancer CNS1 involved in pTreg induction. We show that CNS1 knockout decreased the frequency of pTregs and increased the risk of diabetes. Our results show that pTregs fulfill an important non-redundant function in the prevention of beta cell autoimmunity that causes T1D.

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Commonality in the genetic control of Type 1 diabetes in humans and NOD mice: variants of genes in the IL-2 pathway are associated with autoimmune diabetes in both species

Biochemical Society Transactions ◽

10.1042/bst0360312 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 36 (3) ◽

pp. 312-315 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

Dan B. Rainbow ◽

Laura Esposito ◽

Sarah K. Howlett ◽

Kara M. Hunter ◽

John A. Todd ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Disease Susceptibility ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Interleukin 2 ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Common Disease ◽

Gene Products ◽

Specific Expression ◽

Allele Specific

Variants within the IL-2 (interleukin 2) and CD25 genes are associated with T1DM (Type 1 diabetes mellitus) in mice and humans respectively. Both gene products are essential for optimal immune tolerance and a partial failure to tolerize is linked to the autoimmune responses to insulin and other β-cell proteins that precede T1DM onset. Gene variants that contribute to common disease susceptibility often alter gene expression only modestly. Small expression changes can be technically challenging to measure robustly, especially since biological variation usually contributes negatively to this goal. The present review focuses on allele-specific expression assays that can be used to quantify genotype-determined expression differences such as those observed for IL-2, where the susceptibility allele is transcribed 2-fold less than the resistance allele.

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Glucagon-Like Peptide-2 Reduces Intestinal Permeability But Does Not Modify the Onset of Type 1 Diabetes in the Nonobese Diabetic Mouse

Endocrinology ◽

10.1210/en.2008-1228 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 150 (2) ◽

pp. 592-599 ◽

Cited By ~ 34

Author(s):

Irene Hadjiyanni ◽

Kunmin Karen Li ◽

Daniel J. Drucker

Keyword(s):

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Intestinal Permeability ◽

Barrier Function ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Gut Barrier ◽

Nonobese Diabetic ◽

Gut Barrier Function ◽

Glucagon Like Peptide

The development of type 1 diabetes (T1D) has been linked to environmental factors and dietary components. Increasing evidence indicates that the integrity of the gut mucosa plays a role in the development of autoimmune diseases, and evidence from both preclinical and clinical studies demonstrates that increased leakiness of the intestinal epithelium precedes the development of type 1 diabetes. However, there is limited information on modulation of gut barrier function and its relationship to diabetes development. Here we show that the nonobese diabetic (NOD) mouse, a model of T1D, exhibits enhanced intestinal transcellular permeability before the development of autoimmune diabetes. Treatment of NOD mice with a glucagon-like peptide 2 (GLP-2) analog, synthetic human [Gly2] glucagon-like peptide-2 (h[Gly2]GLP-2, increased the length and weight of the small bowel and significantly improved jejunal transepithelial resistance. However, chronic administration of once daily h[Gly2]GLP-2 failed to delay or reverse the onset of T1D when treatment was initiated in young, normoglycemic female NOD mice. Furthermore, h[Gly2]GLP-2 administration had no significant effect on lymphocyte subpopulations in NOD mice. These findings demonstrate that h[Gly2]GLP-2-mediated enhancement of gut barrier function in normoglycemic NOD mice disease is not sufficient to prevent or delay the development of experimental T1D. Increased intestinal permeability often precedes the clinical appearance of autoimmune disorders such as celiac disease or type 1 diabetes. These studies show that glucagon-like peptide 2 reduces gut permeability, but not the onset of diabetes in NOD mice.

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Chromogranin A Deficiency Confers Protection from Autoimmune Diabetes Via Multiple Mechanisms

10.2337/figshare.16556424.v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Virginia M Stone ◽

Marta Butrym ◽

Minna M Hankaniemi ◽

Amir-Babak Sioofy-Khojine ◽

Vesa P Hytönen ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Type 1 Diabetes ◽

Disease Progression ◽

Neutralizing Antibodies ◽

Autoimmune Diabetes ◽

Disease Model ◽

Disease Onset ◽

Nod Mice ◽

Disease Etiology ◽

Islet Inflammation

Enteroviruses, including the Coxsackievirus Bs (CVB), have been implicated as causal agents in human type 1 diabetes. Immunization of at-risk individuals with a CVB vaccine provides an attractive strategy for elucidating the role of CVBs in the disease etiology. Previously we have shown that an inactivated whole-virus vaccine covering all CVB serotypes (CVB1-6) is safe to administer and highly immunogenic in preclinical models, including non-human primates. Before initiating clinical trials with this type of vaccine it was also important to address whether a) the vaccine itself induces adverse immune reactions including accelerating diabetes onset in a diabetes prone host and b) the vaccine can prevent CVB induced diabetes in a well-established disease model. Here we present results from studies in which female NOD mice were left untreated, mock-vaccinated or vaccinated with CVB1-6 vaccine and monitored for insulitis occurrence or diabetes development. We demonstrate that vaccination induces virus neutralizing antibodies without altering insulitis scores or the onset of diabetes. We also show that NOD mice vaccinated with a CVB1 vaccine are protected from CVB-induced accelerated disease onset. Taken together, these studies show that CVB vaccines do not alter islet inflammation or accelerate disease progression in an animal model that spontaneously develops autoimmune type 1 diabetes. However, they can prevent CVB-mediated disease progression in the same model.

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