Natural polysaccharides exhibit an immunostimulatory effect with low toxicity in humans and animals. It has shown that polysaccharide extracted from Codium fragile (CFP) induces anti-cancer immunity by dendritic cell (DC) activation, while the effect of CFP has not examined in the human immune cells. In this study, we found that CFP promoted the upregulation of CD80, CD83 and CD86 and major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class I and II in human monocyte-derived dendritic cells (MDDCs). In addition, CFP induced the production of proinflammatory cytokines in MDDCs. Moreover, CFP directly induced the activation of Blood Dendritic Cell Antigen (BDCA)1+ and BDCA3+ subsets of human peripheral blood DCs (PBDCs). The CFP-stimulated BDCA1+ PBDCs further promoted activation and proliferation of syngeneic CD4 T cells. The CFP-activated BDCA3+ PBDCs activated syngeneic CD8 T cells, which produced cytotoxic mediators, namely, cytotoxic T lymphocytes. These results suggest that CFP may be a candidate molecule for enhancing immune activation in humans.
Keywords: BDCA1 PBDC; BDCA3 PBDC; Codium fragile polysaccharide; cytotoxic T lymphocyte; helper T cell.