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  2. Involvement of H-Ras in the adaptive immunity of Nile tilapia by regulating lymphocyte activation

Involvement of H-Ras in the adaptive immunity of Nile tilapia by regulating lymphocyte activation

  • Fish Shellfish Immunol. 2019 Jun;89:281-289. doi: 10.1016/j.fsi.2019.04.003.
Xiumei Wei 1 Tianyu Zhao 1 Yu Zhang 1 Kete Ai 1 Huiying Li 1 Jialong Yang 2
Affiliations

Affiliations

  • 1 State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, Laboratory of Aquatic Comparative Immunology, School of Life Sciences, East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200241, China.
  • 2 State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, Laboratory of Aquatic Comparative Immunology, School of Life Sciences, East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200241, China; Laboratory for Marine Biology and Biotechnology, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology, Qingdao, China. Electronic address: jlyang@bio.ecnu.edu.cn.
Abstract

H-Ras is a guanosine triphosphatase (GTPase), which acts as a molecular switch and controls multiple important cellular processes including lymphocyte activation and function. However, regulatory mechanism of adaptive immune response by H-Ras remains unclear in non-mammalian Animals. In the present study, we investigated the involvement of H-Ras in lymphocyte activation with a teleost model Oreochromis niloticus. H-Ras from O. niloticus (On-H-Ras) is highly conserved with those from other vertebrates. The mRNA of On-H-Ras showed a wide expression pattern in the lymphoid-tissues and with the highest level in liver. After Aeromonas hydrophila Infection, transcription of On-H-Ras was significantly induced on day 8 but came back to basal level on day 16, suggesting that On-H-Ras potentially participated in primary response during the adaptive immunity. Furthermore, On-H-Ras mRNA was obviously up-regulated when leukocytes were activated by T lymphocyte mitogen PHA in vitro. Meanwhile, protein level of H-Ras was also augmented once leukocytes were stimulated with lymphocyte receptor signaling agonist PMA and ionomycin. More importantly, once Ras activity was inhibited by specific inhibitor, the up-regulation of lymphocyte activation marker CD122 was obviously impaired during lymphocyte activation process. Therefore, On-H-Ras regulated lymphocyte activation through both mRNA and protein level. Altogether, our results illustrated the involvement of H-Ras in teleost adaptive immunity via controlling lymphocyte activation, and thus provided a novel perspective to understand evolution of the lymphocyte-mediated adaptive immunity.

Keywords

Adaptive immunity; Evolution; H-Ras; Lymphocyte activation; Oreochromis niloticus.

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