Hierarchy in the assembly of HLA-B27 and HLA-Cw3 molecules in transgenic mice

✍ Scribed by Susana Pedrinaci; Julie Hanson; Chella David

• Publisher: Springer-Verlag
• Year: 1994
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 841 KB
• Volume: 39
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0093-7711
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00188616

✦ Synopsis

Cell surface expression of human class I molecules in transgenic mice is dependent upon the available pool of [32-microglobulin ([32m) and the affinity between mouse ~2m and human class I molecules. HLA-B27 and HLA-Cw3 transgenes can be expressed in mouse strains of the H-2 haplotypes b,f, k, and s which encode two endogenous class I genes mapping to H-2K and H-2D. The human class I genes cannot be expressed on H-2 d and H-2q haplotypes which encode three endogenous class I molecules (K,D,L). This suggests that there may be only enough mouse ~2m molecules to support three class I molecules. When both the HLA-B27 and HLA-Cw3 genes are introduced into H-2 l' mice, only HLA-Cw3 reaches the cell surface. This suggests that HLA-Cw3 has a higher affinity than HLA-B27 for mouse ~2m. The possible implications of our findings regarding the assembly, transport, and expression of class I MHC molecules in vivo are discussed.