A comparison of the transcriptional profiles of invariant NKT cells derived from Wild type and Eomes conditional knockout mice

Functional subsets of iNKT cells, NKT1, NKT2 and NKT17, have been reported to arise during the thymus to peripheral differentiation stages. The key transcription factors for NKT1, NKT2 and NKT17 development in the thymus have been identified as T-bet, Gata3 and Rorγt, respectively. In contrast, these iNKT cell subsets can also undergo further differentiation in the periphery. Eomesodermin (Eomes) is a T-box transcription factor with high homology to T-bet and is expressed by activated CD8+ T cells as well as in resting and activated NK cells. However, its role in invariant (i)NKT cells remains unknown. Here, we show the impact of Eomes on iNKT cells in the thymus and peripheral tissue using conditional knockout (Eomes-cKO) mice. Eomes regulates the differentiation of NKT1 cells in the thymus. In the peripheral tissue, Klrg1+ iNKT1 cells are generated in lung after vaccination with -GalCer-pulsed DCs (DC/Gal) as memory like iNKT cells. In the current study, we found that Eomes also regulates their differentiation into memory-like KLRG1+iNKT cells in the periphery. RNA-seq of invariant Natural Killer T cell population in steady state and primed state from 2 genotypes of mice