Hair follicle stem cells (HF-SCs) can initiate psoriasis-like disease in mice

Using lineage-tracing in a well-established psoriasis-like mouse model with inducible epidermal deletion of c-Jun and JunB, we found that mutant HF-SCs survive and express a broad group of pro-inflammatory cytokines, whereas mutant inter-follicular epidermal cells (IFE) disappear over time. Mutant HF-SCs initiate epidermal hyperplasia and skin inflammation by priming neighboring non-mutant epidermal cells to acquire a psoriasis-like phenotype. To explore the molecular mechanisms that govern the behavior of these distinct mutant and non-mutant HF-SCs and IFE cell populations during psoriasis-like disease, RNA sequencing analyses of sorted GFP+, Tomato+ HF-SCs and b-KCs from DKO*-mT/mG mice. Whole-genome transcriptomic analysis was performed by Next-Gen RNA-sequencing in four groups of psoriatic-like epidermal subpopulations: MutantGFP, non-mutantTom basal keratinocytes, mutantGFP and non-mutantTom hair follicle stem cells were purified from the ears of three independent psoriatic-like DKO* mice after 7 days of tamoxifen induction. RNA-seq was also performed in control basal keratinocytes and hair follicle stem cells from the ears of three Control-mT/mG mice.