Abstract
Perforin is a pore-forming protein engaged mainly in mediating target T cell death and is employed by cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) and natural killer cells. However, whether it also plays a role in conventional CD4+ T cell function remains unclear. Here we report that in perforin-deficient (PKO) mice, CD4+ T cells are hyperproliferative in response to T cell receptor (TCR) stimulation. This feature of hyperproliferation is accompanied by the enhancement both in cell division and in IL-2 secretion. It seems that the perforin deficiency does not influence T cell development in thymus spleen and lymph node. In vivo, perforin deficiency results in increased antigen-specific T cell proliferation and antibody production. Furthermore, PKO mice are more susceptible to experimental autoimmune uveitis. To address the molecular mechanism, we found that after TCR stimulation, CD4+ T cells from PKO mice display an increased intracellular calcium flux and subsequently enhance activation of transcription factor NFAT1. Our results indicate that perforin plays a negative role in regulating CD4+ T cell activation and immune response by affecting TCR-dependent Ca2+ signaling.
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Acknowledgements
We thank Drs Hua Gu (Columbia University, USA), Weiguo Zhang (Duke University Medical Center, USA), and Youhai H Chen (University of Pennsylvania, USA) for reviewing the manuscript and for suggestions, and Dr Ilia Voskoboinik (Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Australia) for providing the mouse perforin cDNA in pKS(+) Bluescript. Rag1−/− mice were gifts from Xiaolong Liu (Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, China). This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (30325018, 30530700, 30623003, and 30421005) and CAS project (KSCX1-YW-R-43), grants from the National Key Project 973 (2006CB504300 and 2007CB512404), grants from the Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (04DZ14902, 04DZ19108, 06DZ22032, 04DZ19112, 07XD14033, and 07DZ22916), 863 key project (2006AA02A247), and a grant from the E-institutes of Shanghai Universities Immunology Division.
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Bi, E., Huang, C., Hu, Y. et al. Novel function of perforin in negatively regulating CD4+ T cell activation by affecting calcium signaling. Cell Res 19, 816–827 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/cr.2009.32
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/cr.2009.32
