Elsevier

Neuroscience Letters

Volume 337, Issue 2, 6 February 2003, Pages 73-76
Neuroscience Letters

Expression of Fc receptor for immunoglobulin M in oligodendrocytes and myelin of mouse central nervous system

https://doi.org/10.1016/s0304-3940(02)01312-5Get rights and content

Abstract

Recent advances in neuro-immunology are beginning to elucidate several essential roles of the humoral immunity in both repair and pathogenesis of central nervous system diseases. Immunoglobulin M (IgM) was reported to accelerate the rate of remyelination in a demyelinating disease model, while intrathecal IgM synthesis was shown to predict a more worse disease course in a human demyelinating disease, multiple sclerosis. Molecular mechanisms for either of these IgM functions remain to be studied. Here we report that a recently-found Fc receptor for IgM, namely Fcα/μR, is expressed in oligodendrocytes, their precursor cells, and myelin. These expressions were confirmed by immunocytochemistry of cultured cells, Western blot analysis of myelin fractions, and also by immunohistochemistry of mouse forebrains at different ages. Our findings suggest a possible direct interaction between IgM and Fcα/μR expressed in oligodendrocytes and myelin.

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Acknowledgements

J.N. and H.A. are partly supported by the CREST program of Japan Science and Technology Corporation. This research was supported in part by grants provided by the Special Coordination Funds of the Science and Technology Agency of the Japanese Government (to A.S.).

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These authors contributed equally to this work.

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