BACKGROUNDAutoimmune hepatitis (AIH) is a chronic inflammatory liver disease with unknown etiology. Programmed death 1 (PD-1) and its ligands (PD-L1 and PD-L2), B7-H1/PD-L1 and B7-DC/PD-L2, are new CD28-B7 family members that are involved in the regulation of immune responses. Previous observation suggests that PD-1 system plays an inhibitory role in regulating peripheral blood T cells, B cells and myeloid cells, thus their abnormality may be related to autoimmune diseases. This study aimed to explore the role of PD-1/PD-L1, L2 system in the pathogenesis of AIH.

METHODSThe mice model of experimental autoimmune hepatitis (EAH) was established in C57BL/6 mice and the expression levels of PD-1 and PD-L1, L2 in the murine liver and the cytokines, including interferon (IFN)-gamma, tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-alpha and interleukin (IL)-4 in the spleen were detected using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), and the results were compared with those of normal controls.

RESULTSThe expression levels of PD-1, PD-L1, PD-L2 mRNA were higher in EAH compared with normal controls (P < 0.05), the PD-L2/PD-1 ratio was relatively lower in EAH (EAH -0.08 +/- 0.35, normal controls 0.52 +/- 0.07, P = 0.009). In the EAH, the expression of the three cytokines were all upregulated compared with normal controls. PD-L1 had a positive correlation with the expression of IFN-gamma (r = 0.289, P < 0.05), while PD-L2 showed a positive correlation with both expressions of IL-4 (r = 0.378, P< 0.01) and IFN-gamma (r = 0.261, P < 0.05). While TNF-alpha showed no correlation with PD-L1 (r = 0.044, P = 0.736) or PD-L2 (r = 0.127, P = 0.335).

CONCLUSIONSThe expression of PD-1/PD-L1, L2 is upregulated in EAH and regulated by IFN-gamma and IL-4. PD-1 system may play an important role in the pathogenesis of AIH.

Animals ; Antigens, Surface ; genetics ; Apoptosis Regulatory Proteins ; genetics ; B7-1 Antigen ; genetics ; B7-H1 Antigen ; Hepatitis, Autoimmune ; genetics ; Interferon-gamma ; genetics ; Interleukin-4 ; genetics ; Membrane Glycoproteins ; genetics ; Mice ; Mice, Inbred C57BL ; Peptides ; genetics ; Programmed Cell Death 1 Ligand 2 Protein ; Programmed Cell Death 1 Receptor ; RNA, Messenger ; genetics ; Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha ; genetics

OBJECTIVETo analyze the expression levels of PD-1 (program death factor-1) in peripheral T cells from patients infected with HBV, and to investigate its relationship with HBV serological markers.

METHODSA total of 65 HLA-A2+ subjects, including 31 patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB), 9 with acute resolved hepatitis B (AHB), 15 with HBV related liver cirrhosis (LC) and 10 healthy blood donators, were enrolled. The expression of PD-1 in peripheral T cells and PD-1 ligands PD-L1 and PD-L2 in PBMCs were determined by relative quantitative real-time PCR. The serum HBV markers, HBV DNA load and liver function were also measured.

RESULTSTaken the PD-1 and PD-ligands expression in normal controls as a baseline level, the expression of PD-1 and PD-L1 from CHB patients was significantly increased, while the expression of PD-L2 was relatively low in all groups. In CHB patients, the PD-1 expression in peripheral T cells from patients with high viral load was much higher than that from those with low viral load or from normal controls. And the PD-1 expression level positively correlated with serum HBV DNA load (r=0.41, P<0.01) but not with serum ALT level.

CONCLUSIONLong-term exposure to HBV antigens in CHB patients may increase the expression of PD-1 in T cells and thus leads to the virus persistent infection.

Adult ; Antigens, CD ; genetics ; metabolism ; Apoptosis Regulatory Proteins ; genetics ; metabolism ; B7-H1 Antigen ; DNA, Viral ; blood ; Female ; Hepatitis B virus ; genetics ; Hepatitis B, Chronic ; metabolism ; virology ; Humans ; Intercellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins ; metabolism ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Programmed Cell Death 1 Ligand 2 Protein ; Programmed Cell Death 1 Receptor ; RNA, Messenger ; genetics ; metabolism ; T-Lymphocytes ; metabolism ; Viral Load

Costimulatory molecule B7-H3 is a new member of the B7 immunoregulatory family identified in 2001. Although B7-H3 mRNA is widely detected in a variety of lymphoid and nonlymphoid organs, but the B7-H3 protein is distributed limitedly, generally absent or low expressed in normal tissues. The triggering receptor expressed on myeloid cell (TREM)-like transcript 2 (TLT-2) is a possible receptor for B7-H3, but it is not confirmed. B7-H3 has an important immunologic function having costimulatory or coinhibitory immunoregulatory effects in adaptive immune responses, but its exact mechanism remains contentious. The recent studies reported that aberrant overexpression of B7-H3 was found in a wide range of solid cancer tissues and cells, and associated with more advanced disease and poor prognosis, and directly performed nonimmunological functions in oncogenesis. However, more and more studies demonstrate that B7-H3 also plays an important role in progression of hematologic malignancies. The overexpression of B7-H3 is significantly associated with the malignant degree, relapse, progression and prognosis in haematological malignancies. Thus, B7-H3 represents a novel diagnostic marker and potential therapeutic target for cancers. The immunotherapy targeting to B7-H3 become one of the hotspots of recent researches, and some monoclonal antibodies have already entered into clinical trials. This review summarizes the available data on the relationship between B7-H3 and hematologic malignancies, and further focusing on B7-H3 as a potential therapeutic target in these tumors.
Antibodies, Monoclonal ; B7 Antigens ; Cell Transformation, Neoplastic ; Hematologic Neoplasms ; Humans

OBJECTIVETo explore the role and mechanism of B7 molecules in T cell anergy.

METHODSAnti-B7-1 (CD(80)) and anti-B7-2 (CD(86)) monoclonal antibodies were used to induce T cell anergy. T cell proliferation were assayed by mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) with (3)H-TdR incorporation, and cytokine mRNA transcripts were analyzed with reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). B7-transfected-CHO cells were used as artificial antigen presentation cells (APCs) in MLR to exclude the effects of other costimulatory molecules.

RESULTSMLR results showed that the proliferation of T cells was inhibited to various extents by anti-CD(80) or anti-CD(86) monoclonal antibody, the effect of anti-CD(86) antibody was greater than that of anti-CD(80) antibody, and the proliferation was totally blocked when the two were used together. The results of RT-PCR demonstrated that IL-2 and IFN-gamma mRNA transcripts decreased whereas IL-4 mRNA transcripts increased in T cell after treatment with anti-B7 antibo-dies for 24 hours. In MLR with artificial APC, signal one (DR7) alone could stimulate T cell proliferation at a certain threshold intensity. Costimulator B7-1 molecule could help signal one in T cell proliferation. This effect was blocked by anti-CD(80).

CONCLUSIONB7 molecules play an important role in T cell immune response. Blockade of B7 family resulted in T cell anergy. The role of CD(86) may be more important than that of CD(80). The conversion of cytokine profile from Th1's to Th2's reflected that anergetic T cells were differentiated into Th2 cells by anti-B7 suggesting that anergetic blockade of costimulator molecules may be one of the mechanisms of T cell.

Animals ; Antigens, CD ; genetics ; B7 Antigens ; B7-1 Antigen ; metabolism ; Cricetulus ; Lymphocyte Activation ; immunology ; Membrane Glycoproteins ; T-Lymphocytes ; immunology

PURPOSE: Immune suppression is common in patients with advanced breast cancer but the mechanisms underlying this phenomenon have not been sufficiently studied. In this study, we aimed to identify B7 family members that were able to predict the immune status of patients, and which may serve as potential targets for the treatment of breast cancer. We also aimed to identify microRNAs that may regulate the expression of B7 family members. METHODS: The Cancer Genome Atlas data from 1,092 patients with breast cancer, including gene expression, microRNA expression and survival data, were used for statistical and survival analyses. Polymerase chain reaction and Western blot were used to measure messenger RNA and protein expression, respectively. Luciferase assay was used to investigate direct microRNA target. RESULTS: Bioinformatic analysis predicted that microRNA (miR)-93, miR-195, miR-497, and miR-340 are potential regulators of the immune evasion of breast cancer cells, and that they exert this function by targeting CD274, PDCD1LG2, and NCR3LG1. We chose CD274 for further investigations. We found that miR-195, miR-497, and CD274 expression levels were inversely correlated in MDA-MB-231 cells, and miR-195 and miR-497 expressions mimic inhibited CD274 expression in vitro. Mechanistic investigations demonstrated that miR-195 and miR-497 directly target CD274 3′ untranslated region. CONCLUSION: Our data indicated that the level of B7 family members can predict the prognosis of breast cancer patients, and miR-195/miR-497 regulate CD274 expression in triple negative breast cancer. This regulation may further influence tumor progression and the immune tolerance mechanism in breast cancer and may be able to predict the effect of immunotherapy on patients.
Antigens, CD274 ; B7 Antigens ; Blotting, Western ; Breast Neoplasms ; Computational Biology ; Gene Expression ; Genome ; Humans ; Immune Evasion ; Immune Tolerance ; Immunotherapy ; In Vitro Techniques ; Ligands* ; Luciferases ; MicroRNAs ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Prognosis ; RNA, Messenger ; Triple Negative Breast Neoplasms* ; Untranslated Regions

BACKGROUND: HLA-B27 typing has long been performed by the microlymphocytotoxicity method(MCT) but the flow cytometry method(FCM) was introduced several years ago. False positive results due to the HLA-B7 cross reactive groups(CREG) were the main drawback of the serologic method. The authors performed polymerase chain reaction-sequence specific primer(PCR-SSP) test for HLA-B27 to compare the results with serologic methods. METHODS: PCR-SSP test for HLA-B27 was performed on four hundred forty one samples. Three hundred twenty eight samples were tested by MCT and one hundred thirteen samples by FCM. PCR-SSP for HLA-B27 subtyping or Amplification Refractory Mutation System-PCR(ARMS-PCR) for HLA-B typing was performed on twenty four discrepant samples. RESULTS: The concordance rate between MCT and PCR-SSP was 92.9%(305/328) and the concordance rate between FCM and PCR-SSP was 99.1%(112/113). Twenty four(5.4%) out of four hundred forty one samples showed discrepancy between serologic methods and PCR-SSP method. Fourteen out of one hundred MCT positive samples and only one out of forty FCM positive samples showed negative by PCR-SSP. Nine samples showed PCR-SSP positive and MCT negative. CONCLUSIONS: The false positive rate of MCT was quite high and there were some false positive and negative results by PCR-SSP, too. From the above findings, we suggest that FCM is the most accurate method for HLA-B27 typing in those laboratory equipped with flow cytometry.
Flow Cytometry* ; HLA-B Antigens ; HLA-B27 Antigen* ; HLA-B7 Antigen

The interactions between B7 molecules and CD28-family receptors are crucial in the regulation of adaptive cellular immunity. In cancer, the aberrant expression of co-inhibitory B7 molecules has been attributed to reduced anti-tumor immunity and cancer immune evasion, prompting the development of cancer therapeutics that can restore T cell function. Murine tumor models have provided significant support for the targeting of multiple immune checkpoints involving CTLA-4, PD-1, ICOS, B7-H3 and B7-H4 during tumor growth, and clinical studies investigating the therapeutic effects of CTLA-4 and PD-1 blockade have shown exceptionally promising results in patients with advanced melanoma and other cancers. The expression pattern of co-inhibitory B7 ligands in the tumor microenvironment has also been largely correlated with poor patient prognosis, and recent evidence suggests that the presence of several B7 molecules may predict the responsiveness of immunotherapies that rely on pre-existing tumor-associated immune responses. While monotherapies blocking T cell co-inhibition have beneficial effects in reducing tumor burden, combinatorial immunotherapy targeting multiple immune checkpoints involved in various stages of the anti-tumor response has led to the most substantial impact on tumor reduction. In this review, we will examine the contributions of B7- and CD28-family members in the context of cancer development, and discuss the implications of current human findings in cancer immunotherapy.
B7 Antigens ; Humans ; Immune Evasion ; Immunity, Cellular ; Immunotherapy* ; Ligands ; Melanoma ; Prognosis ; Tumor Burden ; Tumor Microenvironment

OBJECTIVETo investigate the role of B7-H1 expression in IL-10 production, the B7-H1 and IL-10 expression levels in pancreatic carcinoma tissues and to analyze the correlation between B7-H1 expression and IL-10 level.

METHODSThe mRNA and protein levels expressions of B7-H1 and IL-10 in 35 cases of pancreatic cancer and corresponding paracarcinoma tissues and 5 cases of normal pancreas tissues were detected by RT-PCR, Western blot and immunohistochemistry respectively.

RESULTSThe findings for the first time provided the evidences that there was a clear trend for B7-H1 and IL-10 expressions to be most highly expressed in carcinoma tissue, intermediately expressed in paracarcinoma tissue, and expressed at the lowest level in normal pancreatic tissue at mRNA and protein levels. Moreover, there were statistically significant differences in B7-H1 and IL-10 expression between pancreatic carcinoma tissues, corresponding paracarcinoma tissues and normal pancreatic tissues at mRNA and protein levels (P < 0.05). Furthermore, the immunohistochemistry indicated that there were high expression levels of B7-H1 (60.5% +/- 12.7%) and IL-10 (65.3% +/- 16.2%) in pancreatic carcinoma tissues while there were no significant expressions in normal pancreatic tissues. Meanwhile, correlation analysis revealed that B7-H1 expression was significant associated with IL-10 level in tumor tissues at mRNA (P = 0.008, r = 0.841) and protein levels (P = 0.007, r = 0.838).

CONCLUSIONSOver-expression of B7-H1 may be responsible for the increasing IL-10 production in pancreatic cancer, which caused reduced immune response to tumor cells and contributed to pancreatic carcinoma escape from immune attack.

Antigens, CD ; immunology ; B7-H1 Antigen ; Humans ; Immune Evasion ; Interleukin-10 ; immunology ; Pancreatic Neoplasms ; immunology

The objective of study was to investigate the expressions of CD80, CD86 and its ligand CD28 on peripheral lymphocytes in patients with idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP), to explore the effect of interleukin 18 (IL-18) and its clinical significance in ITP. The expressions of co-stimulatory molecules (CD80, CD86 and its ligand CD28) on peripheral lymphocytes from 34 ITP patients and 34 normal humans were detected by immunofluorescence and flow cytometry. The IL-18 in the plasma was detected by using enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). The results showed that the expressions of CD80 and CD86 on peripheral lymphocytes from ITP patients were higher than that of the normal control (4.21 +/- 2.27%, 7.19 +/- 5.16% vs 2.34 +/- 0.87%, 4.08 +/- 1.96%) (P < 0.01); the concentration of IL-18 in plasma of ITP patients was (538.31 +/- 111.33) pg/ml, but the concentration of IL-18 in plasma of controls was (489.44 +/- 49.07) pg/ml. The level of IL-18 negatively correlated with the platelet counts in peripheral blood (r = -0.395, P < 0.05). It is concluded that the CD28/CD80 and CD28/CD86 costimulatory molecules are overexpressed, when the IL-18 level in ITP patients is obviously higher than that in normal controls. When ITP occurred, and the co-stimulatory molecules CD80 and CD86 are closely associated with ITP, it seems that IL-18 may play an important role in ITP pathogenesis.
B7-1 Antigen ; metabolism ; B7-2 Antigen ; metabolism ; CD28 Antigens ; metabolism ; Humans ; Interleukin-18 ; blood ; Lymphocytes ; metabolism ; Purpura, Thrombocytopenic, Idiopathic ; blood ; immunology

OBJECTIVETo study the major histocompatibility complex class II (MHC II) antigen and costimulatory molecules expression on the surface of breast cancer cells.

METHODSMHC II antigen and costimulatory molecule expression on five breast cancer cell lines including MCF-7, SK-BR-3, T47D, MDA-MB-435 and ZR-75-30 were detected through flow cytometery analysis, with their expression level compared with that of normal mammary cell line HBL-100.

RESULTSThe MHC II expression level of the five breast cancer cell lines were significantly different from that of HBL-100 (P < 0.05). MHC II antigen expression of MCF-7 cells which was about 20 percent of HBL-100 was the lowest. MDA-MB-435 and ZR-75-30 cell expression levels were twice as much as that of HBL-100, with the fluorescence intensity of MDA-MB-435 the highest of all cells. CD40 molecule expression on the surface of MDA-MB-435 cells was the lowest, which was nearly ten percent of that of MCF-7 and HBL-100 cells. CD80 and CD86 molecule expression showed no difference in MDA-MB-435 or HBL-100 cell (P > 0.05), and those of the other four breast cancer cells were lower than that of HBL-100 (P < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONMHC II antigen and costimulatory molecule expression on the surface of breast cancer cells is abnormal, with different molecule expression in different cells. Breast cancer cells can escape immune surveillance through abnormal molecule expression.

Antigens, CD ; biosynthesis ; B7-1 Antigen ; biosynthesis ; B7-2 Antigen ; Breast Neoplasms ; immunology ; CD40 Antigens ; biosynthesis ; Cell Membrane ; immunology ; Female ; Histocompatibility Antigens Class II ; biosynthesis ; Humans ; Membrane Glycoproteins ; biosynthesis ; Tumor Cells, Cultured