Age-Related Changes in the Transcriptome of Antibody-Secreting Cells

We analyzed age-related defects in B cell populations from young and aged mice. Microarray analysis of bone marrow resident antibody secreting cells (ASCs) showed significant changes upon aging, affecting multiple genes, pathways and functions including those that play a role in immune regulation, humoral immune responses, chromatin structure and assembly, cell metabolism and the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress response. Aged ASCs expressed higher levels of immunoregulators including PD-1. Increased PD-1 expression was also seen on mature aged B cells indicating early defects in the lineage. High PD-1 expression on the aged ASCs correlated with high cellular reactive oxygen species levels. Mitochondrial defects in aged B cells were further confirmed by the absence of an increases in basal respiration observed upon in vitro stimulation of young B cells B cells from young and old mice were isolated and assayed using Illumina Mouse 6v2 arrays to find transcriptional changes upone aging