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Follicular regulatory T cells expressing Foxp3 and Bcl-6 suppress germinal center reactions

Yeonseok Chung1, Shinya Tanaka, Fuliang Chu

  • 1Department of Immunology, Center for Cancer Immunology Research, The University of Texas-MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, USA. yeonseok.chung@uth.tmc.edu

Nature Medicine
|July 26, 2011
PubMed

Foxp3(+) regulatory T (T(reg)) cells suppress different types of immune responses to help maintain homeostasis in the body. How T(reg) cells regulate humoral immunity, including germinal center reactions, is unclear. Here we identify a subset of T(reg) cells expressing CXCR5 and Bcl-6 that localize to the germinal centers in mice and humans. The expression of CXCR5 on T(reg) cells depends on Bcl-6. These CXCR5(+)Bcl-6(+) T(reg) cells are absent in the thymus but can be generated de novo from CXCR5(-)Foxp3(+) natural T(reg) precursors. A lack of CXCR5(+) T(reg) cells leads to greater germinal center reactions including germinal center B cells, affinity maturation of antibodies and the differentiation of plasma cells. These results unveil a Bcl-6-CXCR5 axis in T(reg) cells that drives the development of follicular regulatory T (T(FR)) cells that function to inhibit the germinal center reactions.

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