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Updated: Aug 8, 2026

3D Organotypic Co-culture Model Supporting Medullary Thymic Epithelial Cell Proliferation, Differentiation and Promiscuous Gene Expression
Published on: July 30, 2015
[Effect of chorionic gonadotropin on thymocyte differentiation in the presence of thymus epithelial cells]
E M Kuklina1, S V Shirshev, N I Sharova
1Institute of Ecology and Genetics of Microorganisms, Ural Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, ul. Goleva 13, Perm, 614081 Russia.
Abstract:
We studied the effects of the main placental hormone, chorionic gonadotropin, on differentiation of human thymocytes in vitro in the presence of thymic epithelial cells. It was shown that the hormone at a high dose (100 IU/ml) enhanced the epithelium-induced phenotypic maturation of thymocytes, which is registered by an increased expression of the membrane marker CD3 and transition of CD4+8+ thymocytes in the cells with CD4+8- and CD4-8+ phenotypes. In addition, gonadotropin enhanced the proliferative response of thymocytes to the mitogen during their cultivation with the epithelium. The stimulating effect of the hormone on the epithelium-induced differentiation of thymocytes is mediated by the humoral factors of epithelial cells. In addition, gonadotropin at this dose exerts its own differentiating activity with respect to thymocytes and stimulates their phenotypic and functional maturation in a monoculture.
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