title: The roles of interferons in osteoclasts and osteoclastogenesis.
abstract: Interferons (IFNs) play essential roles in regulating osteoclast differentiation and bone resorption. Over the last decade, we have seen tremendous developments in our understanding of the mechanisms by which interferons regulate osteoclastogenesis. Of the type I interferons, IFN-β inhibits osteoclastogenesis via autoregulatory or exogenous regulatory mechanisms, while IFN-α was recently shown to participate in regulating osteoclast formation. And the only member of type II interferons, IFN-γ, has biphasic effects on osteoclastogenesis. Type III interferons have also been shown to be involved in osteoclast bone resorption, although no direct regulatory mechanism has been demonstrated. In this review, we provide an update account of the current knowledge on these recently revealed novel roles of interferons in the regulation of a variety of signaling pathways in osteoclast differentiation and function. The potential clinical applications are also discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, General Hospital of Chinese PLA, Fuxing Road 28#, Haidian district, Beijing 100853, China.
authors.forename: Qi
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Xiong
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, General Hospital of Chinese PLA, Fuxing Road 28#, Haidian district, Beijing 100853, China.
authors.forename: Lihai
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Medical Molecular Biology, Department of Immunology, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Dongdan Santiao 5#, Dongcheng district, Beijing 100005, China. Electronic address: wei.ge@chem.ox.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Ge
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, General Hospital of Chinese PLA, Fuxing Road 28#, Haidian district, Beijing 100853, China. Electronic address: pftang301@126.com.
authors.forename: Peifu
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Tang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001862:Bone Resorption / Q000139:chemically induced / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D007372:Interferons / Q000494:pharmacology* / Q000502:physiology*; D010010:Osteoclasts / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D007372:Interferons
keywords: Interferon; Osteoclast; Osteoclastogenesis; Osteolytic diseases