Langerhans Cells Serve as Immunoregulatory Cells by Activating NKT Cells1

• Published in: The Journal of immunology (1950) Vol. 185; no. 8; pp. 4633 - 4640
• Main Authors: Fukunaga, Atsushi, Khaskhely, Noor M., Ma, Ying, Sreevidya, Coimbatore S., Taguchi, Kumiko, Nishigori, Chikako, Ullrich, Stephen E.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 15.09.2010
• ISSN: 0022-1767; 1550-6606
• DOI: 10.4049/jimmunol.1000246

UV exposure alters the morphology and function of epidermal Langerhans cells, which plays a role in UV-induced immune suppression. It is generally believed that UV exposure triggers the migration of immature Langerhans cells (LC) from the skin to the draining lymph nodes, where they induce tolerance. However, because most of the previous studies employed in vitro UV-irradiated LC, the data generated may not adequately reflect what is happening in vivo. In this study we isolated migrating Langerhans cells from the lymph nodes of UV-irradiated mice and studied their function. We found prolonged LC survival in the lymph nodes of UV-irradiated mice. LC were necessary for UV-induced immune suppression because no immune suppression was observed in Langerhans cells-deficient mice. Transferring LC from UV-irradiated mice into normal recipient animals transferred immune suppression and induced tolerance. We found that LC co-localized with lymph node Natural Killer T (NKT) cells. No immune suppression was observed when LC were transferred from UV-irradiated mice into NKT cell-deficient mice. NKT cells isolated from the lymph nodes of UV-irradiated mice secreted significantly more IL-4 than NKT cells isolated from non-irradiated controls. Injecting the wild type mice with anti-IL-4 blocked the induction of immune suppression. Our findings indicate that UV exposure activates the migration of mature LC to the skin draining lymph nodes where they induce immune regulation in vivo by activating NKT cells.