Thymotaxin: a Thymic Epithelial Peptide Chemotactic for T-cell Precursors

Overview

Journal Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A

Specialty Science

Date 1988 Oct 1

PMID 3051002

Citations 2

Authors

B A Imhof

M A Deugnier

J M Girault

S Champion

C Damais

T Itoh

J P Thiery

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

The embryonic thymus is seeded by invading hemopoietic precursor cells that differentiate intrathymically into T lymphocytes. We have recently reported that avian thymic epithelial cells secrete chemotactic peptides, which provoke oriented migration of hemopoietic precursor cells in vitro. The established rat thymic epithelial cell line IT-45 R1 produced a polypeptide that resolves as a single band in the region of 11 kDa on NaDodSO4/polyacrylamide gels. This molecule, which we have named thymotaxin, induced a chemotactic response in a subpopulation of hemopoietic cells from juvenile rat bone marrow. Responding cells were generated by short-term coculture of rat bone marrow hemopoietic cells with mouse bone marrow stroma in a steroid-free medium. Cells selected in a chemotactic chamber have a lymphoid or blast cell morphology. The phenotype of the responding cells is Thy-1+, CD4- [corrected] and CD8-. In contrast, CD8 T-lymphocyte differentiation antigen was expressed after coculture with embryonic thymic monolayers, suggesting that the responding cells correspond to the precursors colonizing the thymus.

Citing Articles

Capacity of neural crest cells from various axial levels to participate in thymic development.

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