PGG-glucan, a soluble beta-(1,3)-glucan, enhances the oxidative burst response, microbicidal activity, and activates an NF-kappa B-like factor in human PMN: evidence for a glycosphingolipid beta-(1,3)-glucan receptor.

PGG-Glucan, a soluble beta-(1,6)-branched beta-(1,3)-linked glucose homopolymer derived from the cell wall of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, is an immunomodulator which enhances leukocyte anti-infective activity and enhances myeloid and megakaryocyte progenitor proliferation. Incubation of human whole blood with PGG-Glucan significantly enhanced the oxidative burst response of subsequently isolated blood leukocytes to both soluble and particulate activators in a dose-dependent manner, and increased leukocyte microbicidal activity. No evidence for inflammatory cytokine production was obtained under these conditions. Electrophoretic mobility shift assays demonstrated that PGG-Glucan induced the activation of an NF-kappaB-like nuclear transcription factor in purified human neutrophils. The binding of 3H-PGG-Glucan to human leukocyte membranes was specific, concentration-dependent, saturable, and high affinity (Kd approximately 6 nM). A monoclonal antibody specific to the glycosphingolipid lactosylceramide was able to inhibit activation of the NF-kappaB-like factor by PGG-Glucan, and ligand binding data, including polysaccharide specificity, suggested that the PGG-Glucan binding moiety was lactosylceramide. These results indicate that PGG-Glucan enhances neutrophil anti-microbial functions and that interaction between this beta-glucan and human neutrophils is mediated by the glycosphingolipid lactosylceramide present at the cell surface.

Activation of rat macrophages by Betafectin PGG-glucan requires cross-linking of membrane receptors distinct from complement receptor three (CR3).

PGG-glucan (Betafectin) is a soluble, highly purified yeast (1,3)-beta-glucan with broad anti-infective and immunomodulatory activities. These studies evaluated the ability of PGG-glucan to directly elicit O2- and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha) production by rat leukocytes in vitro. Particulate beta-glucan stimulated O2- production by the rat NR8383 alveolar macrophage cell line and resident rat peritoneal macrophages, but soluble PGG-glucan did not. In contrast, presentation of PGG-glucan to cells after covalent immobilization to a plastic surface caused a direct stimulation of O2- and TNF-alpha production. The O2- response of rat leukocytes to immobilized PGG-glucan was inhibited by soluble PGG-glucan, indicating that cellular responses to both immobilized and soluble PGG-glucan occur via common cell surface receptors. Because complement receptor type three (CR3) has been proposed as a beta-glucan receptor on human leukocytes, NR8383 cells were evaluated for the presence of CR3. Indirect immunofluorescence and flow cytometric analysis showed that despite being responsive to both particulate and immobilized beta-glucans, NR8383 cells expressed no detectable CR3. These results indicate that the beta-glucan receptors on NR8383 cells are not CR3 and suggest that physical presentation plays an important role in inducing pro-inflammatory leukocyte responses to PGG-glucan.

The colony-stimulating factors induce expression of insulin-like growth factor-I messenger ribonucleic acid during hematopoiesis.

Murine bone marrow cells cultured in the presence of colony-stimulating factor-1 (CSF-1) showed coordinate induction of insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) messenger RNA (mRNA) during the differentiation process, and these transcripts increased approximately 50- to 75-fold over the virtually negligible levels measured in freshly isolated bone marrow. In contrast, transcripts for the IGF-I receptor were evident in freshly isolated rat bone marrow cells and showed a 50% down-regulation during differentiation. Addition of a variety of single lineage and multilineage CSFs, including CSF-1, interleukin-3, granulocyte-macrophage-CSF, and granulocyte-CSF to mouse bone marrow cultures revealed that induction of IGF-I mRNA is a universal feature of differentiation with these CSFs, although IGF-I transcripts are at least 10- to 20-fold higher in CSF-1- and interleukin-3-differentiated lineages than in other cultures. The IGF-I induced by CSF-1 was biologically active because a natural ligand of IGF-I, IGF-binding protein-3, caused significant down-regulation of cellular proliferation, and this could be reversed by the addition of exogenous IGF-I. In addition, whereas IGF-I mRNA could be detected in resident peritoneal macrophages, these transcripts were increased 6-fold after a local injection of thioglycollate, a stimulus that induces macrophage proliferation and differentiation in vivo. These results show that CSFs induce expression of the growth factor IGF-I during differentiation of hematopoietic cells into multiple myeloid lineages and that this endogenously produced IGF-I is also a growth factor for hematopoietic cells. The induction of IGF-I mRNA during hematopoiesis should provide a new approach to understanding the expression of this gene during development and differentiation.

Interferon-gamma inhibits macrophage insulin-like growth factor-I synthesis at the transcriptional level.

Spontaneous production of insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) by inflammatory macrophages contributes to aberrant wound healing, but little is known about regulation of IGF-I synthesis in myeloid cells. The T cell-derived cytokine interferon-gamma (IFN gamma) inhibits several fibrogenic and angiogenic components of the wound-healing response. We have used metabolic labeling of primary colony stimulating factor-1 (CSF-1)-derived macrophages and a transformed macrophage cell line (PU5-1R) followed by immunoprecipitation to demonstrate that synthesis of the 17 kilodalton (kDa) prepro-IGF-I protein by these cells is substantially inhibited by IFN gamma. An exon 4 IGF-I/beta-actin riboprobe expression cassette was used in RNase protection assays to show that IFN gamma also reduces steady state levels of IGF-I mRNA in three different populations of macrophages in a time- and dose-dependent manner. This effect is specific for IFN gamma because neither the IFNs-alpha/beta nor lipopolysaccharide (LPS) affects expression of steady state IGF-I transcripts. Down-regulation of IGF-I mRNA by IFN gamma is dependent on de novo protein synthesis and is abrogated by coculture with cycloheximide. Nuclear run-on assays revealed that elongation of IGF-I transcripts is absent in fresh bone marrow cells but is induced several-fold after cells are cultured for 6 days with CSF-1. Treatment of these CSF-1-derived macrophages with IFN gamma for 6 h substantially inhibits synthesis of IGF-I mRNA. Studies on the decay of IGF-I mRNA in PU5-1R macrophages treated with an RNA polymerase inhibitor confirmed that the decline in IGF-I steady state mRNA in IFN gamma-treated cultures arises from an inhibition of transcription rather than from a reduction in mRNA stability. Since a variety of inflammatory mediators can induce expression of IGF-I in macrophages, inhibition of macrophage IGF-I synthesis by IFN gamma provides a mechanism by which leukocytes regulate levels of this growth factor in their microenvironment.

Expression of type I and type II interleukin-1 receptors in mouse brain.

Although binding sites for IL-1 have been identified in the mouse brain, it is still unknown whether these binding sites correspond to the type I or type II IL-1 receptor. Quantitative autoradiography was used to confirm the presence of specific binding sites for radiolabelled recombinant human IL-1 alpha (125I-HuIL-1 alpha) in the brain of DBA/2 mice. IL-1 binding was highest in the dentate gyrus, consisting of a single class of high affinity binding sites with a Kd of 0.1 nM and a Bmax of 57 fmol/mg protein. A similar Kd of 0.2 nM was obtained using isolated membranes from the whole hippocampus, although the number of binding sites was lower (2 fmol/mg protein). Affinity cross-linking of 125I-Hu-IL-1 alpha to hippocampal membranes revealed the existence of two types of IL-1 receptor proteins, consistent with the sizes of the type I (85 kD) and type II (60 kD) IL-1 receptor. Oligonucleotide probes were then synthesized and used in RT-PCR followed by Southern blotting to show that the whole brain expresses transcripts for both the type I and type II IL-1 receptors. The murine neuroblastoma cell line, C1300, expresses type I rather than type II IL-1 receptor mRNA. The type I receptor protein can be identified by flow cytometry on the membrane of the C1300 neuronal cell line using indirect immunofluorescence with a rat anti-mouse type I IL-1 receptor MoAb. These data show that mouse brain expresses both type I and type II IL-1 receptor mRNA and proteins and offer further support to the idea that type I IL-1 receptors are synthesized and expressed by neurons.