Studies from the Hartmann laboratory [26] first suggested that chromatin or ssRNA components of SLE immunocomplexes can activate TLR-9 in intracellular endosomes of B cells. Such nucleic acid-containing immunocomplexes were shown to activate autoreactive B cells and MK-1775 research buy autoantibody production. TLR-9-active sequence transgenic mice produce large amounts of anti-RNA, -DNA and -nucleosome antibodies of the IgG2a and IgG2b isotype that cause nephritis [27]. B cells

can promptly detect and mount responses to antigen after immunization. In the case of small soluble antigens, responses can be mounted following a simple diffusion of antigen into the lymphoid tissue; however, these encounters are usually mediated through macrophages, DCs and follicular DCs. In addition, macrophages are known to express a wide range of cell-surface receptors that could participate in the presentation of unprocessed antigen,

ALK inhibitor including complement receptors, pattern recognition receptors and/or carbohydrate-binding scavenger receptors [28]. Indeed, macrophage receptor 1 (MAC1; also known as αMβ2 integrin and CD11b–CD18 dimer), which is a receptor for complement component 3 (C3) that is expressed by macrophages, has been suggested to contribute to the retention of antigen on the cell surface [29]. Alternatively, the inhibitory low-affinity receptor for IgG (FcγRIIB) might mediate the internalization and recycling of IgG-containing immune complexes to the macrophage cell surface, as has been shown in DCs [30]. Finally, the C-type lectin DC-specific ICAM3-grabbing non-integrin (DC-sIGn; also known as CD209) could participate in the retention of glycosylated antigens, which Evodiamine is consistent with the observation that mice deficient in the mouse homologue of DC-sIGn, sIGnR1, fail to mount humoral immune responses following infection with Streptococcus pneumonia[31]. The cultured clone I3D spontaneously expresses a high level of MAC1, FcγRIIb and DC-sIGn when cultured in vitro (Fig. 6).

However, once these I3D cells were treated with MIP8a Fab more than 12 h, these expression levels of FcγRIIb and DC-sIGn but not MAC1 were decreased. The inhibitory effect of MIP8a Fab was concentration-dependent, with maximal inhibition at a Fab concentration of 10 µg/ml (Fig. 6). We believe these results could be one of the mechanisms that explain why MIP8a Fab treatment inhibits antibody deposition and subsequent complement activation. Taken together, these data suggest that the role of TLR-9 signalling in macrophages is predominant in the progression of HAF-CpG-GN and blockade of this signalling by monovalent targeting of FcαRI might inhibit disease activity. The inhibitory activity of FcαRIR209L/FcRγ ITAM (iITAM) has been associated with SHP-1 recruitment following weak activation [6,32].