Tohoku J. Exp. Med., 2023 January, 259(1)

Leishmania Regulated MTDH Expression to Suppress Dendritic Cells

Lu Tang,1,2 Siyang Yu,3 Baijing Dong,1 Shengkun Zhang,1 Wanzhen Xu,1 Lanlan Wei2,4 and Ming Chu1

1Department of Neurosurgery, The Third People’s Hospital of Shenzhen, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
2The First Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, School of Stomatology, Harbin Medical University, Harbin, Heilongjiang, China
3Clinical Laboratory, The Seventh Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
4Institute of Hepatology, National Clinical Research Center for Infectious Diseases, The Third People’s Hospital of Shenzhen, The Second Hospital Affiliated to Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China

This study aimed to investigate the correlation between Leishmania infection and dendritic cell infiltration and explore the underlying molecular mechanism how Leishmania infection regulates dendritic cell infiltration. Three datasets, GSE63931, GSE80008 and GSE77528 were combined and their batch effects were removed by Combat function in sva R package. Immune cell infiltrations were estimated using the Microenvironment Cell Populations-counter (MCP-counter) R package. Statistical results were verified by Student’s t test. The differential expression of metadherin (MTDH) was identified by Limma R package. The correlation between MTDH expression and dendritic cell infiltration was estimated by Pearson’s product moment correlation coefficient. GDS5086 was used to explore MTDH expression pattern in dendritic cells infected with Leishmania. Compared with normal samples, 5 types of immune cells showed differential infiltration in leishmaniasis samples, including T cells, CD8+ T cells, dendritic cells, cytotoxic lymphocytes and B lineage cells. Among these, only DCs were significantly suppressed in leishmaniasis samples. Notably, MTDH expression was differential between leishmaniasis and normal samples. There was a significant correlation between MTDH expression and dendritic cell infiltration. In conclusion, these results demonstrate that Leishmania infection leads to the downregulation of MTDH expression and the suppression of dendritic cell infiltration.

Keywords —— dendritic cell; gene expression; infiltration; Leishmania; MTDH

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Tohoku J. Exp. Med 2023, 259, 57-63.

Correspondence: Ming Chu, Department of Neurosurgery, The Third People’s Hospital of Shenzhen, 29 Bulan Road, Shenzhen, Guangdong 518112, China.

e-mail: chuming120@163.com