Characterization of T-cell receptor alpha beta repertoire in synovial tissue from different temporal phases of rheumatoid arthritis.
With the aim of investigating the distribution of T cells expressing different T-cell receptors (TCR) in the inflamed synovial tissue of rheumatoid arthritis patients, we have used the polymerase chain reaction to amplify TCR V alpha and V beta transcripts from synovial biopsies obtained by arthroscopy from patients with arthritis of variable duration. From each of nine patients a single biopsy was taken. Southern hybridization analysis of amplified products revealed extensive heterogeneity of TCR V beta in most patients. On the other hand, restriction in V alpha gene expression was seen in several patients. A highly restricted V alpha repertoire was observed in all cases with arthritis of short duration. In addition, two of three samples of short duration yielded a more limited number of V beta transcripts than the others. No conformity was, however, seen in usage of individual V alpha and V beta transcripts among the investigated patients. The present data thus demonstrate variability in synovial TCR expression between rheumatoid arthritis patients, but they also indicate a development towards greater diversity with increasing disease duration, implicating the necessity for careful choice of cases, preferentially selecting for early stages of disease, when further analysing rheumatoid synovial T cells for TCR usage as well as for antigen specificity.
Bucht
A
A
Department of Clinical Immunology, Uppsala University Hospital, Sweden.
Oksenberg
J R
JR
Lindblad
S
S
Grönberg
A
A
Steinman
L
L
Klareskog
L
L
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001172:Arthritis, Rheumatoid / Q000276:immunology*; D001483:Base Sequence; D015139:Blotting, Southern; D002460:Cell Line; D015342:DNA Probes; D005260:Female; D015870:Gene Expression / Q000276:immunology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D016693:Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta / Q000737:chemistry*; D013583:Synovial Membrane / Q000276:immunology*; D013601:T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology*
D015342:DNA Probes; D016693:Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta