Characterization of a role for Cav1 in the development of the immune response

Someone is diagnosed with some form of blood cancer, like leukemia or lymphoma, every three minutes in the United States. These cancers are aggressive and even lethal. Lymphoma is the cancer of your white blood cells, which are also known as immune cells. One type of immune cell is a T-cell. T-cells protect the body from infection and survey the body for tumor cells. When key components of T-cells, like the immune regulatory gene CAV1, are disrupted, the immune system becomes compromised allowing tumors to arise and expand resulting in lymphoma. Thus, further investigation of genetic markers and biological factors is the key for unlocking the cure to these complex cancers. Consequently, we study the aforementioned gene CAV1 in mouse models for its role in the formation of T-cells, so called ‘thymic selection.’ During thymic selection, T-cells can differentiate into helper or cytotoxic T-cells (CD4+ or CD8+, respectively). Helper cells activate many other immune cells for protection, and cytotoxic cells kill dangerous/infected cells (including tumor cells). We investigated whether the expression of CAV1 plays a part in thymic selection by quantifying these T-cells in the presence of Cav1 (i.e. Cav1+/+), and without Cav1 (i.e. Cav1-/-). It was identified that Cav1-/- mice do not have a biologically significant difference in CD4+, CD8+ populations when compared with wild type/healthy mice at 12 weeks of age. Due to the known role of CAV1 in cancer development, further investigations into the role of CAV1 should be investigated in other immune regulatory mechanisms