AKT family and miRNAs expression in IL-2-induced CD4+T cells

Ranji, Najmeh; Sadeghizadeh, Majid; Karimipoor, Morteza; Shokrgozar, Mohammad Ali; Ebrahimzadeh-Vesal, Reza

doi:10.22038/ijbms.2014.3740

AKT family and miRNAs expression in IL-2-induced CD4+T cells

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Department of Genetics, College of Science, Rasht Branch, Islamic Azad University, Rasht, Iran

² Department of Genetics, School of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

³ Department of Molecular Medicine, Biotechnology Research Center, Pasteur Institute of Iran, Tehran, Iran

⁴ National Cell Bank of Iran, Pasteur Institute of Iran, Tehran, Iran

⁵ Department of Medical Genetics, Faculty of Medicine, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

10.22038/ijbms.2014.3740

Abstract

Objective(s): Study of non-coding RNAs is considerable to elucidate principal biological questions or design new therapeutic strategies. miRNAs are a group of non-coding RNAs that their functions in PI3K/AKT signaling and apoptosis pathways after T cell activation is not entirely clear. Herein, miRNAs expression and their putative targets in the mentioned pathways were studied in the activated CD4⁺T cells.
Materials and Methods: Herein, proliferation rate and IL-2 secretion were measured in treated and untreated cells by IL-2. Putative targets of up-regulated miRNAs were predicted by bioinformatics approaches in the apoptotic and PI3K/AKT signaling pathways. Then the expression of two putative targets was evaluated by quantitative RT-PCR.
Results: Proliferation rate of treated cells by IL-2 increased in a dose- and time- dependent manner. Naive and activated CD4⁺T cells induced by different dose of IL-2 secreted abundant amounts of IL-2. Also, in IL-2 un-induced cells (IL-2 depleted cells) after 3 days, decrease of proliferation has been shown. In silico analysis predicted putative targets of up-regulated miRNAs such as AKT1, AKT3 and apoptotic genes in the activated cells induced or un-induced by IL-2. Decrease of AKT3 was shown by Q-RT-PCR as a potential target of miRNAs overexpressed in IL-2 depleted cells. But there was no significant difference in AKT1 expression in two cell groups.
Conclusion: Our analysis suggests that decrease of AKT3 was likely controlled via up-regulation of specific miRNAs in IL-2 depleted cells. Also it seems that miRNAs play role in induction of different apoptosis pathways in IL-2 induced and un-induced cells.

Keywords

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