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Interview: Glycolipid Antigen Presentation by CD1d and the Therapeutic Potential of NKT cell Activation
18:08

Interview: Glycolipid Antigen Presentation by CD1d and the Therapeutic Potential of NKT cell Activation

Published on: December 31, 2007

Germline-encoded recognition of diverse glycolipids by natural killer T cells

James P Scott-Browne1, Jennifer L Matsuda, Thierry Mallevaey

  • 1Department of Immunology, University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and National Jewish Medical and Research Center, Denver, Colorado, 80206, USA.

Nature Immunology
|September 11, 2007
PubMed

Natural killer T cells expressing 'invariant' T cell receptor alpha-chains (TCRalpha chains) containing variable (V) and joining (J) region V(alpha)14-J(alpha)18 (V(alpha)14i) rearrangements recognize both endogenous and microbial glycolipids in the context of CD1d. How cells expressing an invariant TCRalpha chain and a restricted set of TCRbeta chains recognize structurally diverse antigens is not clear. Here we show that a V(alpha)14i TCR recognized many alpha-linked glycolipids by means of a 'hot-spot' of germline-encoded amino acids in complementarity-determining regions 3alpha, 1alpha and 2beta. This hot-spot did not shift during the recognition of structurally distinct antigens, suggesting that the V(alpha)14i TCR functions as a pattern-recognition receptor, conferring on natural killer T cells the ability to sense and respond in an innate way to pathogens displaying antigenic alpha-linked glycolipids.

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