| First Author | Corre I | Year | 2001 |
| Journal | J Exp Med | Volume | 194 |
| Issue | 7 | Pages | 903-14 |
| PubMed ID | 11581313 | Mgi Jnum | J:134058 |
| Mgi Id | MGI:3784909 | Doi | 10.1084/jem.194.7.903 |
| Citation | Corre I, et al. (2001) Analysis of thymocyte development reveals that the GTPase RhoA is a positive regulator of T cell receptor responses in vivo. J Exp Med 194(7):903-14 |
| abstractText | Loss of function of the guanine nucleotide binding protein RhoA blocks pre-T cell differentiation and survival indicating that this GTPase is a critical signaling molecule during early thymocyte development. Previous work has shown that the Rho family GTPase Rac-1 can initiate changes in actin dynamics necessary and sufficient for pre-T cell development. The present data now show that Rac-1 actions in pre-T cells require Rho function but that RhoA cannot substitute for Rac-1 and induce the actin cytoskeletal changes necessary for pre-T cell development. Activation of Rho is thus not sufficient to induce pre-T cell differentiation or survival in the absence of the pre-T cell receptor (TCR). The failure of RhoA activation to impact on pre-TCR-mediated signaling was in marked contrast to its actions on T cell responses mediated by the mature TCR alpha/beta complex. Cells expressing active RhoA were thus hyperresponsive in the context of TCR-induced proliferation in vitro and in vivo showed augmented positive selection of thymocytes expressing defined TCR complexes. This reveals that RhoA function is not only important for pre-T cells but also plays a role in determining the fate of mature T cells. |
