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Early postnatal castration affects thymic and thymocyte noradrenaline levels and β-adrenoceptor-mediated influence on the thymopoiesis in adult rats

2006; Elsevier BV; Volume: 182; Issue: 1-2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/j.jneuroim.2006.10.004

1872-8421

Gordana Leposavić, Katarina Radojević, Biljana Vidić‐Danković, Duško Kosec, Ivan Pilipović, Milica Perišić Nanut,

Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior

The interactions among the nervous, endocrine and immune system were studied by examining: i) thymic and thymocyte catecholamine levels in adult rats castrated (Cx) at postnatal day 3 and ii) effects of 14-day-long propranolol (P) treatment on main thymocyte differentiational molecule expression in adult non-Cx and Cx rat. The results demonstrated that castration in early postnatal period lowers levels of both neurally- and thymocyte-derived noradrenaline in adult rats, and thereby diminishes beta-adrenoceptor-mediated fine tuning of the T-cell differentiation/maturation. In non-Cx rats P affected TCRalphabeta-dependent stages of thymocyte differentiation/maturation decreasing frequency of CD4+8+ double positive (DP) TCRalphabeta(low) cells entering selection processes and increasing relative number of positively selected DP TCRalphabeta(high) (most likely due to an increased thymocyte surface density of Thy-1 that is involved in negative control of TCRalphabeta-mediated signaling/selection thresholds) and the most mature CD4+8- TCRalphabeta(high) cells (including CD4+25+ regulatory cells). However, in Cx rats P failed to produce any significant changes in thymocyte subset composition.