Browsing by Subject "Immunoglobulin E"

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    Beta-arrestin-2 regulates the development of allergic asthma.
    (J Clin Invest, 2003-08) Walker, Julia KL; Fong, Alan M; Lawson, Barbara L; Savov, Jordan D; Patel, Dhavalkumar D; Schwartz, David A; Lefkowitz, Robert J
    Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disorder of the airways that is coordinated by Th2 cells in both human asthmatics and animal models of allergic asthma. Migration of Th2 cells to the lung is key to their inflammatory function and is regulated in large part by chemokine receptors, members of the seven-membrane-spanning receptor family. It has been reported recently that T cells lacking beta-arrestin-2, a G protein-coupled receptor regulatory protein, demonstrate impaired migration in vitro. Here we show that allergen-sensitized mice having a targeted deletion of the beta-arrestin-2 gene do not accumulate T lymphocytes in their airways, nor do they demonstrate other physiological and inflammatory features characteristic of asthma. In contrast, the airway inflammatory response to LPS, an event not coordinated by Th2 cells, is fully functional in mice lacking beta-arrestin-2. beta-arrestin-2-deficient mice demonstrate OVA-specific IgE responses, but have defective macrophage-derived chemokine-mediated CD4+ T cell migration to the lung. This report provides the first evidence that beta-arrestin-2 is required for the manifestation of allergic asthma. Because beta-arrestin-2 regulates the development of allergic inflammation at a proximal step in the inflammatory cascade, novel therapies focused on this protein may prove useful in the treatment of asthma.
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    Particulate allergens potentiate allergic asthma in mice through sustained IgE-mediated mast cell activation.
    (2010) Jin, Cong
    In recent years, the incidence of allergic asthma as well as the severity of disease has rapidly increased worldwide. Numerous epidemiological studies have related the exacerbation of allergic asthma with exposure to increased ambient particles from air pollutants. However, the mechanism by which particulate allergens (pAg) exacerbate allergic asthma remains undefined. To evaluate this, we modeled environmental pAg induced allergic asthma by exposing mice to polystyrene beads coated with natural allergen extracts. Compared to equal amounts of soluble allergen extracts (sAg), pAg triggered markedly enhanced airway hyper-responsiveness and pulmonary eosinophilia in allergen sensitized mice. The cellular basis for this effect was determined to be mast cells (MCs), as both airway allergic responses were attenuated in MC deficient KitWsh/KitW-sh mice compared to MC reconstituted KitW-sh/KitW-sh mice. The divergent responses of MCs to pAg versus sAg were due to differences in the termination rate of IgE/FcεRI initiated signaling. Following ligation of sAg, IgE/FcεRI rapidly shuttled into a degradative endosome/lysosome pathway. However, following ligation by pAg, IgE/FcεRI migrated into lipid raft enriched compartments and subsequently failed to follow a degradative pathway, which resulted in a prolonged signaling and heightened synthesis of proinflammatory mediators. These observations highlight the overlooked contributions of the particulate nature of allergens and mast cell endocytic circuitry to the aggravation of allergic asthma.