Physiology, Molecular biology and therapeutic potential of the thymic peptide thymulin.

PARDO J; SCHWERDT JI; REGGIANI PC; ZAPPA VILLAR MF; PEREYRA AS; BROWN OA; GOYA RG

Physiological Mini Reviews

Argentine Physiological Society

Año: 2012 vol. 6 p. 2 - 12

1669-5402

Thymulin is a thymic hormone exclusively produced by the thymic epithelial cells. After itsdiscovery and initial characterization in the ?70s, it was demonstrated that thymulinproduction and secretion is strongly influenced by the neuroendocrine system. Conversely, agrowing core of information, to be reviewed here, points to thymulin as a hypophysiotropicpeptide. Additionally, the substantial body of evidence pointing to thymulin and somesynthetic analogs as anti-inflammatory and analgesic molecules in the brain and other organswill be also reviewed. In recent years, a synthetic DNA sequence coding for a biologicallyactive analog of thymulin, metFTS, was constructed and cloned in different adenoviralvectors. A number of recent studies suggest that thymulin gene therapy may be a suitabletherapeutic strategy to prevent some of the endocrine and reproductive alterations thattypically appear in congenitally athymic (nude) mice, used as a suitable model ofneuroendocrine and reproductive aging. Summing up, the present article briefly reviews theliterature on the physiology of the thymulin-neuroendocrine axis and the anti-inflammatoryproperties of the molecule and its analogs. The availability of novel biotechnological toolsshould boost basic studies on the molecular biology of thymulin and should also allow anassessment of the potential of gene therapy to restore circulating thymulin levels inthymodeficient animal models and eventually, in humans.