Chu Yang, Wang Fengming, Zhou Meng, Chen Lujun, Lu Yahua
Department of General Internal Medicine, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, Jiangsu, China.
Testing Center, Center for Disease Prevention and Control, Changzhou 213000, Jiangsu, China.
Acta Histochem. 2014 Apr;116(3):539-43. doi: 10.1016/j.acthis.2013.10.009. Epub 2013 Nov 25.
Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic and systematic autoimmune inflammatory disease. Recently, a novel T cell subset, follicular helper CD4 T cell (Tfh cells) was found in relation to the pathogenesis and progression of RA, and increased numbers of circulating Tfh cells were found in RA patients. However, there is little evidence regarding the localization of Tfh cells in synovium tissues from RA patients, owing to the lack of an available method to characterize their localization in tissue. The aim of our present study was to characterize the Tfh cells in rheumatoid synovium tissues from RA patients by using immunohistochemistry and triple-fluorescence immunostaining methods. Our results showed that specific staining of CD4, CXCR5 and ICOS could be found on infiltrating immune cells in rheumatoid synovium tissues. The use of triple-fluorescence immunostaining and confocal laser scanning showed immunolocalization of CD4(+)CXCR5(+)ICOS(+)T cells (Tfh cells) in the rheumatoid synovium tissues, whereas these signals were absent in osteoarthritis (OA) synovium and in normal synovium tissues. Thus the data from our present preliminary study support the notion that CD4(+)CXCR5(+)ICOS(+)Tfh cells could be found in rheumatoid synovium tissues from RA patients, indicating the possibility that this T cell subset in synovium tissues may have important roles in the pathogenesis and progression of RA.
类风湿关节炎（RA）是一种慢性系统性自身免疫性炎症疾病。最近，发现了一种新型T细胞亚群——滤泡辅助性CD4 T细胞（Tfh细胞），其与RA的发病机制和病情进展相关，并且在RA患者中发现循环Tfh细胞数量增加。然而，由于缺乏一种可用于表征其在组织中定位的方法，关于RA患者滑膜组织中Tfh细胞定位的证据很少。我们当前研究的目的是通过免疫组织化学和三重荧光免疫染色方法来表征RA患者类风湿滑膜组织中的Tfh细胞。我们的结果显示，在类风湿滑膜组织中的浸润免疫细胞上可发现CD4、CXCR5和ICOS的特异性染色。使用三重荧光免疫染色和共聚焦激光扫描显示，CD4(+)CXCR5(+)ICOS(+)T细胞（Tfh细胞）在类风湿滑膜组织中存在免疫定位，而在骨关节炎（OA）滑膜和正常滑膜组织中不存在这些信号。因此，我们当前初步研究的数据支持这样一种观点，即CD4(+)CXCR5(+)ICOS(+)Tfh细胞可在RA患者的类风湿滑膜组织中发现，这表明滑膜组织中的这种T细胞亚群可能在RA的发病机制和病情进展中发挥重要作用。
