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Functional characterization of the biogenic amine transporters on human macrophages
Phillip M. Mackie, … , Michael S. Okun, Habibeh Khoshbouei
Phillip M. Mackie, … , Michael S. Okun, Habibeh Khoshbouei
Published January 11, 2022
Citation Information: JCI Insight. 2022;7(4):e151892. https://doi.org/10.1172/jci.insight.151892.
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Research Article Inflammation Neuroscience

Functional characterization of the biogenic amine transporters on human macrophages

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Abstract

Monocyte-derived macrophages (MDMs) are key players in tissue homeostasis and diseases regulated by a variety of signaling molecules. Recent literature has highlighted the ability for biogenic amines to regulate macrophage functions, but the mechanisms governing biogenic amine signaling in and around immune cells remain nebulous. In the CNS, biogenic amine transporters are regarded as the master regulators of neurotransmitter signaling. While we and others have shown that macrophages express these transporters, relatively little is known of their function in these cells. To address these knowledge gaps, we investigated the function of norepinephrine transporter (NET) and dopamine transporter (DAT) on human MDMs. We found that both NET and DAT are present and can uptake substrate from the extracellular space at baseline. Not only was DAT expressed in cultured MDMs, but it was also detected in a subset of intestinal macrophages in situ. Surprisingly, we discovered a NET-independent, DAT-mediated immunomodulatory mechanism in response to LPS. LPS induced reverse transport of dopamine through DAT, engaging an autocrine/paracrine signaling loop that regulated the macrophage response. Removing this signaling loop enhanced the proinflammatory response to LPS. Our data introduce a potential role for DAT in the regulation of innate immunity.

Authors

Phillip M. Mackie, Adithya Gopinath, Dominic M. Montas, Alyssa Nielsen, Aidan Smith, Rachel A. Nolan, Kaitlyn Runner, Stephanie M. Matt, John McNamee, Joshua E. Riklan, Kengo Adachi, Andria Doty, Adolfo Ramirez-Zamora, Long Yan, Peter J. Gaskill, Wolfgang J. Streit, Michael S. Okun, Habibeh Khoshbouei

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Figure 1

Human monocytes and monocyte-derived macrophages express NET and DAT, but not SERT.

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Human monocytes and monocyte-derived macrophages express NET and DAT, bu...
(A) Schematic depicting the isolation of PBMCs from human whole blood via density-dependent centrifugation with Ficoll. A fraction of the isolated PBMCs was used for flow cytometric analysis, and the remaining cells were plated in monocyte-adhesion media with autologous serum and allowed to differentiate into monocyte-derived macrophages. (B) Density plots of flow cytometry data on acutely isolated human PBMCs show that approximately 18.2% of circulating monocytes are DAT+ and approximately 4.56% of circulating monocytes are NET+ (scatter plots representative of 3 independent experiments). SERT was not detected on monocytes. (C) qPCR on cultured human monocyte-derived macrophages indicates that the mRNA for DAT protein is expressed in these cells (n = 26). (D–F) Cultured human monocyte-derived macrophages were either prepared for Western blot analysis (D), or immunocytochemistry (E and F). Representative Western blots from lysates of cultured human monocyte-derived macrophages probed for SERT, NET, or DAT. Human monocyte-derived macrophages did not express SERT (positive control: human platelets) but did express both NET (positive control: NET-expressing CHO cells) and DAT (positive control: YFP-DAT-expressing CHO cells) (n = 3 independent experiments). (E) Representative confocal images of human monocyte-derived macrophages immunostained for IBA1 and either NET, DAT, or SERT. IBA+ cells (macrophages) were positive for NET and DAT, but not SERT (n = 3 independent experiments). (F) Threshold-based quantification of NET+ (top), DAT+ (middle), and SERT+ (bottom) IBA1+ macrophages based on images in E indicating that 78% of macrophages were NET+, nearly 97% were DAT+, and only 8% were SERT+.

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