Content area
Abstract
A central question in developmental biology pertains to how interacting groups of cells and molecules give rise to tissues exhibiting specialized forms and functions. It is hoped that these results may provide the basis for further descriptive and functional studies that will help to elucidate the role ofTNF-like proteins in embryonic development. Whether the in vitrodata presented here reflect a potential physiological (or pathophysiological) role of TNF in myogenesis and in the male gonad function requires further studies. Nontheless, these observations illustrate that a cytokine can have many effects and that the actions of a single peptide on a single cell type can be very complex.
We have shown that:
- both soluble and transmembrane form of TNF facilitates C2/7 mouse myoblast cell migration and aggregation in vitro,
TNF enhances the proliferating activity ofthe C2/7 myoblast cells,
TNF inhibits the expression of myofilament components, like а-skeletal actin, myosin heavy chain and myosin light chain in C2/7 myoblast cells,
TNF inhibits the expression of the genes of myogenic regulatory factors: MyoD and myogenin in C2/7 myoblast cells,
as a consequence, TNF inhibits myofilament formation and differentiation of C2/7 myoblast cells,
TNF triggers migration and aggregation of 45-T1 Sertoli cells in vitro,
TNF induces highly organised 3-dimensional structures of 45-T1 Sertoli cells that contain several adhering junctions and desmosomes resembling to seminiferous tubules oftestis,
expression of laminin and desmin are highly upregulated in TNF-treated 45-T1 Sertoli cells,
TNF has no effect on the presence of other cytosceletal elements, like alpha- and betatubulin, cytoskeletal actin, cytokeratin, vinculin and vimentin in any conditions we tested.
