Investigation the effect of polyamine depletion on T cell differentiation under T helper 2-skewing conditions

Polyamines contribute to a myriad of fundamental biological processes, including transcription, translation, cell-cell interactions, cell proliferation, and differentiation. However, these effects of polyamines on CD4+ T helper cells largely unknown. The goal of this project is to find genes involved in polyamines in T cell differentiation under T helper 2 (Th2)-skewing conditions. To investigate the effect of polyamine depletion on T cell differentiation, we used difluoromethylornithine (DFMO), an inhibitor of ornithine dcarboxylase, which is the first enzyme of polyamine biosynthesis. Naïve T cells were stimulated by the Dynabeads Mouse T-Activator CD3/CD28 and cultured under non-skewing, IL-4, IL-4 + DFMO and IL-4 + DFMO + putrescine conditions, and then messenger RNA expression of T cells was compared in these four different conditions.