Kooten, “Interleukin-17 and CD40Ligand synergistically enhance cytokine and chemokine production by renal epithelial cells

Abstract. Renal allograft rejection is characterized by an influx of inflammatory cells. Interaction between infiltrating T cells and resident parenchymal cells might play an important role in the ongoing inflammatory response. The present study demon-strates that CD40L, a product of activated T cells, is locally expressed in kidneys undergoing rejection. Furthermore, dur-ing rejection, CD40 expression not only is present on most graft infiltrating cells but also is increased on resident tubular epithelial cells (TEC). To obtain more detailed insight in the consequences of T cell/TEC interaction, we analyzed the pro-duction of chemokines, including interleukin-8 (IL-8), mono-cyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) and regulated upon activation, normal T cell expressed and secreted (RANTES), and the production of IL-6 by cultured human primary TEC in response to activation with CD40L in vitro. In addition, w