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Extracellular redox modulation by regulatory T cells

Nature Chemical Biology volume 5, pages 721–723 (2009)Cite this article

Abstract

We demonstrate that the mechanism of redox remodeling during mouse T-cell activation involves secretion of glutathione by dendritic cells and its subsequent cleavage to cysteine. Extracellular cysteine accumulation results in a lower redox potential, which is conducive to proliferation, and changes the net redox status of exofacial protein domains. Regulatory T cells inhibit this redox metabolite signaling pathway, which represents a previously unrecognized mechanism for immunosuppression of effector T cells.

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Figure 1: Mechanism of Cysex accumulation.
Figure 2: Treg-mediated extracellular redox remodeling.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by a grant from the US National Institutes of Health (DK64959 and NIH5P60 DK20572).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biological Chemistry, University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

    Zhonghua Yan, Sanjay K Garg & Ruma Banerjee

  2. Department of Neuroscience, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA

    Jonathan Kipnis

Authors
  1. Zhonghua Yan
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  2. Sanjay K Garg
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  3. Jonathan Kipnis
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  4. Ruma Banerjee
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the experimental design, data analysis and manuscript writing. Z.Y. and S.K.G. performed the experiments.

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Correspondence to Ruma Banerjee.

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Yan, Z., Garg, S., Kipnis, J. et al. Extracellular redox modulation by regulatory T cells. Nat Chem Biol 5, 721–723 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nchembio.212

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