title: Quantitative assessment of myelin basic protein-reactive T cell entry to the central nervous system by using oligonucleotide probes complementary to VDJ junctional sequences of rat TCR beta-chain.
abstract: The VDJ junctional region represents the most diverse part of the antigenic TCR. We have previously reported that of 200 sequenced TCR beta-chains of rat MBP-reactive T cells, rarely did two share sequence homology over the entire CDR3 region. In this study, we demonstrate that sequences of the TCR CDR3 region are excellent clonotypic markers for rat MBP-reactive T cell clones and oligonucleotide probes complementary to the CDR3 region of three T cell clones specifically recognized the TCR from which they were derived, but failed to recognize syngeneic T cells that express a similar TCR beta-chain or T cells that share both V beta and J beta usage. To explore this observation, we determined the ability of MBP-reactive T cell clones to enter the CNS. We were able to show that some MBP-reactive T cell clones have an augmented ability to enter the CNS and that fully-activated T cells have a higher penetrating activity than their less-activated T cell counterparts.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, University of Alabama at Birmingham 35294, USA. dsun@uab.edu
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Coleclough
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Cao
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: J N
authors.initials: JN
authors.lastname: Whitaker
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D015415:Biomarkers; D001921:Brain / Q000276:immunology; D002999:Clone Cells / Q000276:immunology; D004681:Encephalomyelitis, Autoimmune, Experimental / Q000276:immunology*; D015870:Gene Expression; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D004676:Myelin Basic Protein / Q000276:immunology*; D015345:Oligonucleotide Probes / Q000235:genetics*; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D051381:Rats; D011917:Rats, Inbred Lew; D016693:Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D013601:T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology*
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D004676:Myelin Basic Protein; D015345:Oligonucleotide Probes; D016693:Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta