秀丽隐杆线虫先天免疫信号转导途径

Current Progress on the Signal Transduction Pathway of Innate Immunity in Caenorhabditis Elegans

秀丽隐杆线虫因其结构简单、易于培养、生命周期短等特点作为一种模式生物已广泛应用于神经系统、衰老机制及细胞程序性死亡的研究。与高等生物不同,秀丽隐杆线虫缺少适应性免疫途径,只有先天免疫途径在抗病原菌、抗氧化应激等方面发挥重要的作用。其体内的胰岛素/胰岛素样生长因子(insulin/IGF-1)、转化生长因子β(transforming growth factorβ,TGF-β)、丝裂原激活的蛋白激酶(mitogen activated protein kinases,MAPK)和细胞程序性死亡(programmed cell death,PCD)4条免疫相关信号转导途径在不同的环境发挥着主要作用。同时,秀丽隐杆线虫的先天免疫系统在进化中有许多保守之处,这为高等生物的免疫机制研究提供了新思路。据此,就有关秀丽隐杆线虫先天免疫信号转导途径的研究进展进行了简述,期望能为人类等高等生物相关联的免疫作用研究提供借鉴和参考。

Caenorhabditis elegans （C. elegans） has been widely used as a model organism in the research of nervous system, aging mechanisms and programmed cell death, owing to its advantages of simple tissue structure, easily culture, short lifecycle. Different from higher organisms, C. elegans is lack of adaptive immune, only the innate immune plays an important role in anti-bacteria, anti-oxidative stress and so on. Four immune-related signal transduction pathway in C. elegans, including insulin-receptor-like pathway, transforming growth factor （TGF-13） pathway, mitogen activated protein kinases （MAPK） pathway and programmed cell death （PCD） pathway play major roles in various conditions of environment. Meanwhile, the innate immune system of C. elegans is conservative in many respects, which provides new idea for research of immune mechanism in higher organisms. Accordingly. The progress on innate immune signal transduction pathway in C. elegans is reviewed, expecting to provide some reference for investigating innate immune related to higher organisms including mankinds.