PRE-ELAFIN: a Th2 cytokine profile inducer?

TATEOSIAN, NANCY; GUERRIERI, D; ALIJA, A; GARCIA, V; CHULUYAN, E

Buenos Aires, Argentina

Congreso; First French Argentine Immunology Congress. LVIII Reunión Anual de la Sociedad Argentina de Inmunología; 2010

PRE-ELAFIN (skin derived anti-leukoproteinase) is a 9.9kDa serine proteinase inhibitor, precursor of ELAFIN which contains multiple transglutaminase substrate domains. The increased PRE-ELAFIN expression is well documented in inflammatory conditions in epidermis, bronchial epithelial cells, intestinal epithelium and endometrial epithelial cells. The aim of the present work was to investigate whether PRE-ELAFIN modifies the Th1 or Th2 cell pattern of cytokines. First, peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) were incubated with IL-2 in the presence or not of rhPRE-ELAFIN. After 5 days, proliferation was measured by [3H]-Thymidine uptake. We observed that rhPRE-ELAFIN decreased lymphocyte proliferation induced by IL-2 (control: 76.4±20.6% vs 20.3±2.3%, p<0.05). This effect was dose-dependent. Furthermore, cytokines were measured in the cell culture supernatant with a flow cytometry bead array kit. An increased of IL-4, IL-6 and IL-10 was observed in the culture supernatant of PBMC treated with rhPRE-ELAFIN (IL-4 control: 147±28 pg/ml vs 948±328 pg/ml, p<0.05; IL-6 control: 2370±1024 pg/ml vs 4475±1020 pg/ml, p<0.05; IL-10 control: 99±41 pg/ml vs 430±155 pg/ml, p<0.05), while it did not modify IFN-ã levels. The increase production of IL-4 by PBMC treated with rhPRE-ELAFIN was confirmed by performing an intracellular staining of IL-4 on T cells. Overall, these results suggest that PRE-ELAFIN is a Th2 factor inducer.