title: The colony-stimulating factor-1 receptor is a specific marker of macrophages from the bony fish gilthead seabream.
abstract: We report the molecular cloning of the colony-stimulating factor-1 receptor gene from the bony fish gilthead seabream (sbCSF-1R). The deduced sbCSF-1R shows a predicted signal sequence, a transmembrane domain and a tyrosine kinase domain, all in conserved positions. A transcript showing a premature stop codon that predicted the removal of 84 C-terminal amino acids was also found. RT-PCR expression studies demonstrate that, although the sbCSF-1R transcripts are found in different immune tissues, including gill, liver, spleen, blood, peritoneal exudate, thymus and head-kidney (HK), their expression is confined to the monocyte/macrophage lineage. Furthermore, the expression of sbCSF-1R might be modulated by the activation stage of the macrophages, since both the infection of fish and the in vitro activation of leukocytes resulted in the down-regulation of gene expression. These data indicate that the CSF-1R may be used as a specific probe for cells of the monocyte/macrophage lineage in the gilthead seabream, an immunological tractable fish model. In addition, the functional characterisation of the CSF-1R and its ligand may shed light into the mechanisms of proliferation and the pathways of differentiation of macrophages in bony fish.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cell Biology, Faculty of Biology, University of Murcia, 30100 Murcia, Spain.
authors.forename: Francisco J
authors.initials: FJ
authors.lastname: Roca
authors.forename: M A Pilar
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Sepulcre
authors.forename: Gloria
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: López-Castejón
authors.forename: José
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Meseguer
authors.forename: Victoriano
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Mulero
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D015415:Biomarkers; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D018076:DNA, Complementary / Q000235:genetics; D029941:Fish Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000276:immunology; D015870:Gene Expression; D007962:Leukocytes / Q000276:immunology; D008264:Macrophages / Q000276:immunology*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D016186:Receptor, Macrophage Colony-Stimulating Factor / Q000235:genetics* / Q000276:immunology; D021541:Sea Bream / Q000235:genetics* / Q000276:immunology*; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D018076:DNA, Complementary; D029941:Fish Proteins; D016186:Receptor, Macrophage Colony-Stimulating Factor