text: Imiquimod, a Toll-like receptor-7 agonist, induces perforin in cytotoxic T lymphocytes in vitro.
  Imiquimod (IMQ), an activator of Toll-like receptor-7 (TLR-7), induces by several routes a profound anti-viral and anti-tumor effect in vivo. Physiologically, the immune system is using perforin-containing granules of cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTL) towards the same biological purpose. This functional synergism prompted our current experiments addressing the question whether IMQ may influence perforin-release and/or induce perforin in CTLs in vitro. In peripheral lymphocytes of healthy and diseased subjects, IMQ induced a significant increase of perforin(+) CTLs within 12h in all experiments performed. This effect was most pronounced in CTLs of patients suffering from atopic dermatitis, a model disorder for subnormal perforin expression: as compared to perforin(+) CTLs detected at time point zero (100%), up to 270% of perforin(+) CTLs were induced by 2.5 microg/ml [corrected] IMQ. Perforin release from peripheral blood CTLs after PMA/ionomycin-stimulation was not influenced significantly by IMQ. Thus, the biological activity of IMQ appears to exceed its previously known functions, inasmuch as it boosts up significantly the perforin-granule system.
entities.id: T10 T11 T12 T13 T14 T15 T16 T17 T18 T19 T1 T20 T21 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7 T8 T9
entities.type: GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y GENE-Y CHEMICAL GENE-Y GENE-Y CHEMICAL CHEMICAL CHEMICAL CHEMICAL CHEMICAL CHEMICAL CHEMICAL GENE-Y
entities.text: perforin Toll-like receptor-7 perforin perforin perforin TLR-7 perforin perforin perforin Perforin Imiquimod Toll-like receptor-7 perforin IMQ IMQ IMQ IMQ IMQ IMQ Imiquimod perforin