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Updated: Jul 10, 2026

Intravital Imaging of Intraepithelial Lymphocytes in Murine Small Intestine
Published on: June 24, 2019
Intestinal intraepithelial lymphocytes have a promiscuous interleukin-8 receptor
A I Roberts1, M Bilenker, E C Ebert
1Department of Medicine, UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Brunswick 08903, USA.
Background:
Human intraepithelial lymphocytes (IELs), predominantly T cells of the CD8+CD45RO+ phenotype that are situated between epithelial cells, have a chemotactic response to the alpha-chemokines, IL-8 and GRO, and the beta-chemokine, and the protein termed regulated on activation, normal T cell expressed and secreted (RANTES).
Aim:
To evaluate the specificity of the IL-8 receptor on IELs.
Methods:
Specificity was determined by the degree of desensitisation of the IL-8 response caused by each chemokine and the degree of inhibition of IL-8 binding to the cell.
Results:
IELs migrated towards two additional beta chemokines, macrophage inflammatory protein-1 and monocyte chemotactic protein (MCP). All chemokines inhibited IL-8 induced chemotaxis and calcium ion mobilisation by IELs, with IL-8 having the greatest effect and MCP the least. In addition, specific binding of radiolabelled IL-8 to IELs was reduced by each of the five chemokines in cold competition experiments, whereas only GRO and IL-8 itself displaced 125I-IL-8 from receptors on peripheral blood mononuclear cells.
Conclusions:
The IL-8 responsiveness of IELs is desensitised by chemokines of both the alpha and beta families, and this is likely to occur by the binding of the chemokines to common receptors.
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