Revealing stromal and lymphoid sources of Col3a1-expression during inflammation using a novel reporter mouse

Larissa C da Rosa; Hannah E Scales; Sangeet Makhija; Katie Sutherland; Robert A Benson; James M Brewer; Paul Garside

doi:10.1093/discim/kyac008

Revealing stromal and lymphoid sources of Col3a1-expression during inflammation using a novel reporter mouse

Discov Immunol. 2022 Nov 21;1(1):kyac008. doi: 10.1093/discim/kyac008. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Larissa C da Rosa¹, Hannah E Scales¹, Sangeet Makhija¹, Katie Sutherland¹, Robert A Benson¹, James M Brewer¹, Paul Garside¹

Affiliation

¹ School of Infection and Immunity, College of Medical, Veterinary, and Life Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8TA, UK.

Abstract

One of the earliest signs of dysregulation of the homeostatic process of fibrosis, associated with pathology in chronic conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis, is the overexpression of collagen type III (COL-3). Critically, there is still relatively little known regarding the identity of the cell types expressing the gene encoding COL-3 (Col3a1). Identifying and characterizing Col3a1-expressing cells during the development of fibrosis could reveal new targets for the diagnosis and treatment of fibrosis-related pathologies. As such, a reporter mouse expressing concomitantly Col3a1 and mKate-2, a fluorescent protein, was generated. Using models of footpad inflammation, we demonstrated its effectiveness as a tool to measure the expression of COL-3 during the repair process and provided an initial characterization of some of the stromal and immune cells responsible for Col3a1 expression.

Keywords: Col3a1; collagen type III; fibrosis; footpad inflammation; reporter mouse.