Immunological effects of reduced mucosal integrity in the early life of BALB/c mice

Certain stimuli at the gut barrier may be necessary in early life to establish a proper balance of immune tolerance. We evaluated a compromised barrier in juvenile mice in relation to microbiota and local and systemic immunity. BALB/c mice were treated with a low dose of dextran sulfate sodium (DSS) with or without ampicillin and lipopolysaccharide (LPS) to clarify the importance of microbial antigens and interaction between microbial-associated patterns and toll-like receptors. The barrier breach resulted in increased plasma LPS, which was highest in mice treated simultaneously with ampicillin. Adding LPS in the food reduced its levels in plasma. Regulatory T cells were acutely increased in mesenteric lymph nodes (MLN) and spleen during DSS treatment regardless of simultaneous ampicillin treatment. In contrast, NK T and NK cells decreased in MLN and in spleen. This acute DSS effect was reflected in fold changes of haptoglobin and Il1a in colon, and this was also more pronounced in mice simultaneously treated with ampicillin. On day 1 post-treatment, major upregulations of Ifng, Foxp3, Il1b, Il2, and Il6 genes in colon were only observed in the mice simultaneously treated with ampicillin. A two-fold upregulation of colonic Foxp3 and Il1a was evident 25 days post-treatment. DSS skewed the microbiota in favor of Gram negative phyla. Therefore, increased permeability induced tolerogenic immunity independent of microbiota, and this was enhanced by LPS stimulation

Airport emission particles:Exposure characterization and toxicity following intratracheal instillation in mice

Background: Little is known about the exposure levels and adverse health effects of occupational exposure to airplane emissions. Diesel exhaust particles are classified as carcinogenic to humans and jet engines produce potentially similar soot particles. Here, we evaluated the potential occupational exposure risk by analyzing particles from a non-commercial airfield and from the apron of a commercial airport. Toxicity of the collected particles was evaluated alongside NIST standard reference diesel exhaust particles (NIST2975) in terms of acute phase response, pulmonary inflammation, and genotoxicity after single intratracheal instillation in mice. Results: Particle exposure levels were up to 1 mg/m3 at the non-commercial airfield. Particulate matter from the non-commercial airfield air consisted of primary and aggregated soot particles, whereas commercial airport sampling resulted in a more heterogeneous mixture of organic compounds including salt, pollen and soot, reflecting the complex occupational exposure at an apron. The particle contents of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and metals were similar to the content in NIST2975. Mice were exposed to doses 6, 18 and 54 μg alongside carbon black (Printex 90) and NIST2975 and euthanized after 1, 28 or 90 days. Dose-dependent increases in total number of cells, neutrophils, and eosinophils in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid were observed on day 1 post-exposure for all particles. Lymphocytes were increased for all four particle types on 28 days post-exposure as well as for neutrophil influx for jet engine particles and carbon black nanoparticles. Increased Saa3 mRNA levels in lung tissue and increased SAA3 protein levels in plasma were observed on day 1 post-exposure. Increased levels of DNA strand breaks in bronchoalveolar lavage cells and liver tissue were observed for both particles, at single dose levels across doses and time points. Conclusions: Pulmonary exposure of mice to particles collected at two airports induced acute phase response, inflammation, and genotoxicity similar to standard diesel exhaust particles and carbon black nanoparticles, suggesting similar physicochemical properties and toxicity of jet engine particles and diesel exhaust particles. Given this resemblance as well as the dose-response relationship between diesel exhaust exposure and lung cancer, occupational exposure to jet engine emissions at the two airports should be minimized.publishedVersionPeer reviewe

The Breakthroughs and Caveats of Using Human Pluripotent Stem Cells in Modeling Alzheimer’s Disease

Modeling Alzheimer’s disease (AD) using human-induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) is a field now spanning 15 years. Developments in the field have shown a shift in using simple 2D cortical neuron models to more advanced tri-cultures and 3D cerebral organoids that recapitulate more features of the disease. This is largely due to development and optimization of new cell protocols. In this review, we highlight recent major breakthroughs in the AD field and the implications this has in modeling AD using iPSCs (AD-iPSCs). To date, AD-iPSCs have been largely used to recapitulate and study impaired amyloid precursor protein (APP) processing and tau phosphorylation in both familial and sporadic AD. AD-iPSCs have also been studied for varying neuronal and glial dysfunctions. Moreover, they have been useful for discovering new molecular mechanisms, such as identifying proteins that bridge APP processing with tau phosphorylation and for identifying molecular pathways that bridge APP processing dysfunction with impaired cholesterol biosynthesis. Perhaps the greatest use of AD-iPSCs has been in discovering compounds via drug screening, that reduce amyloid beta (Aβ) in neurons, such as the anti-inflammatory compound, cromolyn, and antiparasitic drugs, avermectins. In addition, high content screening using AD-iPSCs has led to the identification of statins that can reduce levels of phosphorylated tau (p-Tau) in neurons. Some of these compounds have made it through to testing in human clinical trials. Improvements in omic technologies including single cell RNA sequencing and proteomics as well as advances in production of iPSC-cerebral organoids and tri-cultures is likely to result in the further discovery of new drugs and treatments for AD. Some caveats remain in the field, including, long experimental conditions to create mature neurons, high costs of media that limit research capabilities, and a lack of reproducibility using current iPSC-cerebral organoid protocols. Despite these current limitations, AD-iPSCs remain an excellent cellular model for studying AD mechanisms and for drug discovery

The Breakthroughs and Caveats of Using Human Pluripotent Stem Cells in Modeling Alzheimer’s Disease

Modeling Alzheimer’s disease (AD) using human-induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) is a field now spanning 15 years. Developments in the field have shown a shift in using simple 2D cortical neuron models to more advanced tri-cultures and 3D cerebral organoids that recapitulate more features of the disease. This is largely due to development and optimization of new cell protocols. In this review, we highlight recent major breakthroughs in the AD field and the implications this has in modeling AD using iPSCs (AD-iPSCs). To date, AD-iPSCs have been largely used to recapitulate and study impaired amyloid precursor protein (APP) processing and tau phosphorylation in both familial and sporadic AD. AD-iPSCs have also been studied for varying neuronal and glial dysfunctions. Moreover, they have been useful for discovering new molecular mechanisms, such as identifying proteins that bridge APP processing with tau phosphorylation and for identifying molecular pathways that bridge APP processing dysfunction with impaired cholesterol biosynthesis. Perhaps the greatest use of AD-iPSCs has been in discovering compounds via drug screening, that reduce amyloid beta (Aβ) in neurons, such as the anti-inflammatory compound, cromolyn, and antiparasitic drugs, avermectins. In addition, high content screening using AD-iPSCs has led to the identification of statins that can reduce levels of phosphorylated tau (p-Tau) in neurons. Some of these compounds have made it through to testing in human clinical trials. Improvements in omic technologies including single cell RNA sequencing and proteomics as well as advances in production of iPSC-cerebral organoids and tri-cultures is likely to result in the further discovery of new drugs and treatments for AD. Some caveats remain in the field, including, long experimental conditions to create mature neurons, high costs of media that limit research capabilities, and a lack of reproducibility using current iPSC-cerebral organoid protocols. Despite these current limitations, AD-iPSCs remain an excellent cellular model for studying AD mechanisms and for drug discovery

Reduced early life mucosal integrity decreases thymic cell counts and increases local, but not thymic regulatory, T cell recruitment: Gut mucosal integrity breach and thymic T cells

Early life immune gut microbiota contact is critical for regulatory T cell–mediated oral tolerance induction. We induced a mucosal integrity breach with low dextran sulfate sodium dose right after weaning in BALB/c mice along with a standard high dose to study the impact of increased gut microbiota lymphatic tissue contact on the thymus. Both doses increased gut permeability, which caused a short-term generalized thymic involution and regulatory T cell induction in the mesenteric lymph nodes, even in the absence of clinically apparent inflammation in the low-dose group. The thymic regulatory T cells resisted thymic involution. In the low-dose group, we found acutely altered gut mobilization patterns characterized by changed gut-homing marker CD103 expression on mesenteric lymph node CD4 + T cells as well as on mature CD8 + T cells and developing CD4 − /CD8 − thymocytes. Furthermore, CD218a (IL-18-receptor-a) expression was acutely decreased on both mature CD8 + T cells and regulatory T cells, while increased on the mesenteric lymph node CD8 + T cells, indicating a direct link between the thymus and the mesenteric lymph nodes with CD218a in a functional role in thymic involution. Acute and non-persisting regulatory responses in the mesenteric lymph nodes were induced in the form of a relative regulatory T cell increase. We saw no changes in total thymic regulatory T cells and thus the thymus does not seem to play a major role of in the regulatory immunity induced by increased gut microbiota lymphatic tissue contact around weaning, which in our study primarily was located to the gut

Plasma lipopolysaccharides.

<p>Lipopolysaccharides measured by ELISA in plasma of mice during, as well as 1 and 25 days post-treatment with 1.5% dextran sulfate sodium (DSS), 1g/L ampicillin and/or diet containing 40.8 mg/kg lipopolysaccharides (LPS). Box and whisker plots, + shows mean; whiskers: min.-max., n = 5–6 per group (p.t. = post-treatment, p-values: ** = <0.01; *** = p<0.001, compared to control group. All controls from day 3 were only 50% above detection limit of the assay).</p

Distribution of the 20 most abundant phyla on day 25 post-treatment (DSS+Ampicillin (+LPS) groups combined).

<p>Overview of relative phylogenetic distribution and details of variation down to genus level of gut microbiota of untreated control mice compared to mice 25 days post-treatment with 1.5% dextran sulfate sodium (DSS), 1g/L ampicillin (Amp) and/or diet containing 40.8 mg/kg lipopolysaccharides (LPS). There were too few reads from DSS+Amp and DSS+Amp+LPS mice on day 3 and day 1 post-treatment. As no qualitative or quantitative differences in bacterial composition were found between DSS+Amp mice and DSS+Amp+LPS on day 25 post-treatment, these groups were combined for this time point. See <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0176662#pone.0176662.g005" target="_blank">Fig 5</a> for control group and DSS group. See <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0176662#pone.0176662.s005" target="_blank">S2 Table</a> for analysis of variance.</p