Gene profiling analysis of mouse splenic DC subpopulations. Mus musculus

To characterize differences between BALB/c splenic CD11cintB220+Gr1+ PDCs (plasmacytoid dendritic cells), CD11cintB220+CD49b+ IKDCs (interferon producing killer-dendritic cells), and CD11chighB220- cDCs (conventional dendritic cells), we performed gene expression profile analysis using Affymetrix chips. We FACS-sorted BALB/c spleen DC subpopulations. Comparison of differentially expressed genes between IKDCs and cDCs vividly revealed selective expression of multiple NK-related genes in IKDCs . These included granzymes A, B, K and M, perforin, Fas ligand, and NK receptors such as NKG2A, NKG2D, Ly49 family genes, NKR-P1, NKG7, NKp46 and Mafa (KLRG1). No NK-related genes were highly expressed in the PDCs. Keywords: Cell type comparison Overall design: We prepared two biological samples separately for each DC population, and analyzed the expression profiles by comparing to those of cDCs (control sample).