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Fas expression on peripheral blood lymphocytes in systemic lupus erythematosus: relation to the organ damage and lymphocytes apoptosis

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Abstract

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a common autoimmune disease with complex etiology. Recently, a possible role of apoptotic cells in its pathogenesis has been suggested. This study is to evaluate the expression of Fas antigen on peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBLs) in SLE, to determine whether membrane Fas (mFas) has a role in the organ damage in SLE and to explore its relationship with the early apoptosis of the PBLs in SLE. Flow cytometry was used to evaluate the expression of mFas on PBLs in 68 Chinese SLE patients and 37 healthy controls. Systemic lupus international collaborative clinics/american colleges of rheumatology damage index (SDI) scores were calculated to further estimate the relationship of the expression of mFas with disease severity. Results showed that mFas expression levels were significantly higher (P < 0.01) among SLE patients than those in healthy controls. Higher (P = 0.01) expressions of mFas were found in patients with SDI scores ≥ as compared to those with SDI scores <3. Patients with neuropsychiatric or renal disease had a higher expression of mFas than those without neuropsychiatric (P = 0.03) or renal disease (P = 0.01). In addition, the expression levels had a positive (r = 0.381, P < 0.01) correlation with the early apoptosis rate of PBLs in SLE patients. Taken together, our study showed that Fas-expressing PBLs were increased in SLE patients, especially in patients with higher SDI score, and the expression levels of mFas were correlated to the organ damage and lymphocytes apoptosis.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (30571608, 30771848), the Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province (070413109) and the Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education (20070366002). We are grateful to the subjects who participated in this study. We express our thanks to the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University and Anhui Provincial Hospital, for their supports.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Anhui Medical University, 81 Meishan Road, 230032, Hefei, Anhui, China

    Lian-Hong Li, Wen-Xian Li, Ou Wu, Guo-Qing Zhang, Hai-Feng Pan & Dong-Qing Ye

  2. Department of Rheumatology, Anhui Provincial Hospital, Hefei, China

    Xiang-Pei Li

  3. Department of Rheumatology, First Affiliated Hospital, Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China

    Jian-Hua Xu & Hong Dai

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  1. Lian-Hong Li
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  2. Wen-Xian Li
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Correspondence to Dong-Qing Ye.

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Li, LH., Li, WX., Wu, O. et al. Fas expression on peripheral blood lymphocytes in systemic lupus erythematosus: relation to the organ damage and lymphocytes apoptosis. Mol Biol Rep 36, 2047–2052 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-008-9415-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-008-9415-0

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