Proteome of thymus and spleen reveals that 10-hydroxydec-2-enoic acid could enhance immunity in mice

ABSTRACT

Objectives: 10-hydroxydec-2-enoic acid (10-HDA), a unique component of royal jelly existing only in nature, has the potential to promote human health. Knowledge of 10-HDA in regulating immuno-activity, however, is lacking. The aim of our work is to gain a novel understanding of 10-HDA in promoting immunity.

Methods: Immuno-suppressed mice were generated by cyclophosphamide injection, After 10-HDA supplementation to the mice to rescue their immunity, the proteomes of the thymus and spleen were analyzed.

Results: The weight of the body, thymus, and spleen in cyclophosphamide-induced mice recovered by 10-HDA indicate its potential role in immuno-organ protection. In the thymus, the enhanced activity of pathways associated with DNA/RNA/protein activities may be critical for T-lymphocyte proliferation/differentiation, and cytotoxicity. In the spleen, the induced pathways involved in DNA/RNA/protein activities, and cell proliferative stimulation suggest their vital role in B-lymphocyte affinity maturation, antigen presentation, and macrophage activity. The up-regulated proteins highly connected in networks modulated by 10-HDA indicate that the mice may evolve tactics to respond to immuno-organ impairment by activating critical physiological processes.

Conclusion: Our data constitute a proof-of-concept that 10-HDA is a potential agent to improve immunity in the thymus and spleen and offer a new venue for applying natural products to the therapy for hypoimmunity.

KEYWORDS:

• 10-HDA
• mouse
• proteome
• spleen
• thymus

Author Contributions

Pei Fan, Liping Wang and Jianke Li designed the study. Jing Nie and Xiaofeng Tang performed the animal experiment. Pei Fan, Bin Han, Han Hu, Qiaohong Wei, Xufeng Zhang and Lifeng Meng worked for protein extraction, peptide preparation, MS analysis and western blotting. Pei Fan, Xinyue Tian and Lu Zhang completed the bioinformatic analysis. Pei Fan and Jianke Li wrote the manuscript.

Declaration of Interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer Disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose

Data Availability

The MS proteomic data supporting the conclusions of this article are available in the iProX (www.iprox.org) repository, with the project ID (IPX0001739000), which is open to public.

Supplemental Material

Supplementary data for this article can be accessed here.

Additional information

Funding

This work is supported by the open project fund from Key Laboratory of Pollinating Insect Biology, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, P. R. China (2017MFNZS01), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31402026), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Henan Provincial Colleges and Universities (2015RCJH06), the Modern Agro-Industry Technology Research System (CARS-44), the Agricultural Science and Technology Innovation Program (CAAS-ASTIP-2015-IAR), the earmarked fund for Modern Agro-Industry Technology Research System (CARS-45), and National Project for Upgrading beekeeping industry of China.