Browsing by Author "Boucher, Austin"

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    The miR-23a∼27a∼24-2 microRNA Cluster Promotes Inflammatory Polarization of Macrophages
    (The American Association of Immunologists, 2021) Boucher, Austin; Klopfenstein, Nathan; Hallas, William Morgan; Skibbe, Jennifer; Appert, Andrew; Jang, Seok Hee; Pulakanti, Kirthi; Rao, Sridhar; Cowden Dahl, Karen D.; Dahl, Richard; Microbiology and Immunology, School of Medicine
    Macrophages are critical for regulating inflammatory responses. Environmental signals polarize macrophages to either a pro-inflammatory (M1) state or an anti-inflammatory (M2) state. We observed that the microRNA cluster mirn23a, coding for miRs-23a~27a~24–2, regulates mouse macrophage polarization. Gene expression analysis of mirn23a deficient myeloid progenitors revealed a decrease in Toll like receptor and interferon signaling. Mirn23a−/− bone marrow derived macrophages (BMDMs) have an attenuated response to lipopolysaccharide (LPS) demonstrating an anti-inflammatory phenotype in mature cells. In vitro, mirn23a−/− BMDMs have decreased M1 responses and an enhanced M2 responses. Overexpression of mirn23a has the opposite effect enhancing M1 and inhibiting M2 gene expression. Interestingly expression of mirn23a miRNAs goes down with inflammatory stimulation and up with anti-inflammatory stimulation suggesting that its regulation prevents locking macrophages into polarized states. M2 polarization of tumor associated macrophages (TAMs) correlates with poor outcome for many tumors, so to determine if there was a functional consequence of mirn23a loss modulating immune cell polarization we assayed syngeneic tumor growth in wildtype and mirn23a−/− mice. Consistent with the increased anti-inflammatory/ immunosuppressive phenotype in vitro, mirn23a−/− mice inoculated with syngeneic tumor cells had worse outcomes compared to wildtype mice. Co-injecting tumor cells with mirn23a−/− BMDMs into wildtype mice phenocopied tumor growth in mirn23a−/− mice supporting a critical role for mirn23a miRNAs in macrophage mediated tumor immunity. Our data demonstrates that mirn23a regulates M1/M2 polarization and suggests that manipulation of mirn23a miRNA can be used to direct macrophage polarization to drive a desired immune response.
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    The mirn23a and mirn23b microrna clusters are necessary for proper hematopoietic progenitor cell production and differentiation
    (Elsevier, 2018) Kurkewich, Jeffrey L.; Boucher, Austin; Klopfenstein, Nathan; Baskar, Ramdas; Kapur, Reuben; Dahl, Richard; Microbiology and Immunology, School of Medicine
    Mice deficient for microRNA (miRNA) cluster mirn23a exhibit increased B lymphopoiesis at the expense of myelopoiesis, whereas hematopoietic stem and progenitor cell (HSPC) populations are unchanged. Mammals possess a paralogous mirn23b gene that can give rise to three mature miRNAs (miR-23b, miR-24-1, and miR-27b) that have identical seed/mRNA-targeting sequences to their mirn23a counterparts. To assess whether compound deletion of mirn23a and mirn23b exacerbates the hematopoietic phenotype observed in mirn23a−/− mice, we generated a compound mirn23a−/−mirn23bfl/fl:Mx1-Cre conditional knockout mouse and assayed hematopoietic development after excision of mirn23b. Loss of both genes in adult bone marrow further skewed HSPC differentiation toward B cells at the expense of myeloid cells, demonstrating a dosage-dependent effect on regulating cell differentiation. Strikingly, double-knockout (DKO) mice had decreased bone marrow cellularity with significantly decreased hematopoietic stem cell and HSPC populations, a phenotype not observed in mice deficient for mirn23a alone. Competitive transplantation assays showed decreased contribution of mirn23a−/−mirn23b−/− HSPCs to hematopoietic lineages at 6 and 12 weeks after transplantation. Defects in the proliferation of mirn23a−/−b−/− HSPCs was not observed; however, DKO cells were more apoptotic compared with both wild-type and mirn23a−/− cells. Together, our data show that complete loss of mirn23a/mirn23b miRNAs results in decreased blood production and affects lineage output in a concentration-dependent manner.