Background: The thymus is an immune organ essential for life and plays a crucial role in the development of T cells. It undergoes a fetal to adult developmental maturation process occurring in mouse during the postnatal months. The molecular modifications underlying these ontogenic changes are essentially unknown. Here we used a differential proteomic-based technique (2D-Difference Gel Electrophoresis) coupled with matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-time of flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry to search for key proteins in the postnatal development of the thymus. Eight different BALB/c mice were used in the study: four mice aged of 1 day (neonatal) and four mice aged of 60 days (adult). Protein samples derived from thymus were labeled and run in 2D-PAGE (Two-Dimensional Polyacrylamide Gel Electrophoresis). One whole-thymus tissue from each mouse was run on gels and each gel containing a pooled sample of the eight mice was run in parallel. The pooled sample was set as the internal pool, containing equal amount of each protein extract used in the experiment. Gels were matched and compared with Difference In-gel Analysis software. Differential spots were picked, in-gel digested and peptide mass fingerprints were obtained.
Results: Among the differentially regulated proteins in neonatal thymus group, 111 proteins were identified by mass spectrometry, of which 95 proteins were up-regulated and 16 proteins were down-regulated. The identified proteins belong to several functional categories, including cell proliferation, cycle and apoptosis, transcription regulation, signal transduction, nucleotide processing, proteolysis and translation, protein folding, metabolism, oxidoreduction, cytoskeleton, immune response, and embryonic development. The major interaction networks comprised of cellular function and maintenance, cellular assembly and organization, and metabolism were also identified by STRING analysis.
Conclusions: The demonstrated molecular changes are relevant for understanding thymus development as well as neonatal immune function, and they provide the diagnostic disease markers. Further studies will be required to describe in detail the role of the identified proteins in thymus maturation and in the specific functions of neonatal thymus.