Fig. 7: CD8+ T cells interact with BEC membranes through E-cadherin–β-catenin interactions.
From: Expression of E-cadherin by CD8+ T cells promotes their invasion into biliary epithelial cells
a Left: Immunohistochemistry (IHC) staining of a liver tissue section from a patient with primary biliary cholangitis (PBC), showing CD69+ (green), CD103+ (magenta) CD8+ (grey) T cells adhered to bile ducts. E-cadherin staining (orange) intensifies at contact points between T cell and epithelial cell. White arrows show attached or partially internalised CD69+ CD103+ CD8+ T cells. Right: Pixel intensity profiles along the length of the attached or partially internalised cells (white arrows and red lines on the bottom right panel). Numbers on profile plot are matched to numbers for each arrowed cell shown in the merged panel. Profile lines in graphs match the colours used in the IHC panel (E-cadherin = orange, CD103= magenta, CD69 = green, DAPI = cyan). Orange arrows show spikes of E-cadherin pixel intensity. b IHC staining of a liver tissue section from a patient with primary biliary cholangitis (PBC), showing CD103+ (magenta) CD8+ (grey) T cell adhered to bile ducts comprised of biliary epithelial cells (BEC) expressing E-cadherin (orange) and β-catenin (green). c High power, Z-stack confocal micrograph showing inset region of (b) (yellow box). Top row shows 3D-reconstruction (left) and 3D-volume rendered version (right). Bottom row shows magnified image of the BEC-T cell interface. Left: rendered versions of CD103, DAPI, E-cadherin and β-catenin. Right: replication of left panel with CD103 render made semi-transparent and with only colocalising E-cadherin and β-catenin displayed (grey). Yellow arrow denotes area of E-cadherin expression localised to the CD8+ T cell membrane which is not colocalised with β-catenin. d Orthographical confocal micrograph showing immunocytochemistry (ICC) staining for E-cadherin (yellow) and β-catenin (magenta) of BEC co-cultured with 48 h activated CD8+ T cells (CellTracker™ Red, orange). Cells were co-cultured for 4 h prior to fixation and staining. Bottom left panel shows version of top left panel with only colocalising E-cadherin and β-catenin displayed (grey). Right image shows 3D-volume rendered version of bottom left panel.
