title: TNF-alpha-induced regulation and signalling in macrophages.
abstract: Tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha) is a pleiotropic cytokine produced predominantly by macrophages. In addition, macrophages respond to TNF-alpha by differentiating to express different groups of gene products. Our laboratory recently showed that the context in which TNF-alpha is recognized by macrophages dramatically impacts the pattern of gene expression and hence investigating the mechanism of TNF-alpha signal transduction will be important in understanding how this molecule regulates macrophage differentiation. TNF-alpha is recognized by two cell surface receptors, CD120a (p55) and CD120b (p75) that belong to the TNF/NGF receptor family. Signalling is initiated by receptor multimerization in the plane of the plasma membrane. The initial signalling events activated by receptor cross-linking are unknown although activation of the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) cascade occurs shortly after ligand binding to CD120a (p55). We have investigated the upstream kinases that mediate the activation of p42mapk/erk2 following cross-linking of CD120a (p55) in mouse macrophages. Exposure of mouse macrophages to TNF-alpha stimulated a time-dependent increase in the activity of MEK1, that temporally preceded peak activation of p42mapk/erk2. MEKs, dual specificity T/Y kinases, act as a convergence point for several signalling pathways including Ras/Raf, MEKK and Mos. Incubation of macrophages with TNF-alpha was found to transiently stimulate an MEKK that peaked in activity within 30 sec of exposure and progressively declined towards basal levels by 5 min. By contrast, under these conditions, activation of either c-Raf-1 or Raf-B was not detected. These data suggest that the activation of the MAPK cascade in response to TNF-alpha is mediated by the sequential activation of an MEKK and MEK1 in a c-Raf-1 and Raf-B-independent fashion. The implications of these findings will be discussed in the context of the regulation of macrophage gene expression.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine, Denver, CO, USA.
authors.forename: D W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Riches
authors.forename: E D
authors.initials: ED
authors.lastname: Chan
authors.forename: B W
authors.initials: BW
authors.lastname: Winston
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D006801:Humans; D008264:Macrophages / Q000187:drug effects / Q000276:immunology* / Q000378:metabolism*; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000187:drug effects / Q000276:immunology*; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha