Front. central signaling pathway to mediate that increase. Furthermore, activity of protein kinase Laminin (925-933) C is necessary for HIV induction of C3, since inhibition of protein kinase C by prolonged exposure to the phorbol ester tetradecanoyl phorbol acetate partly abolished the HIV effect. The cytokines tumor necrosis factor alpha and gamma interferon were not involved in mediating the HIV-induced C3 Laminin (925-933) upregulation, since neutralizing antibodies had no effect. Besides whole HIV virions, the purified viral proteins Nef and gp41 are biologically active in upregulating C3, whereas Tat, Laminin (925-933) gp120, and gp160 were not able to modulate C3 synthesis. Further experiments revealed that neurons were also able to respond on incubation with HIV with increased C3 synthesis, although the precise pattern was slightly different from that in astrocytes. This strengthens the hypothesis that HIV-induced complement synthesis represents an important mechanism for the pathogenesis of AIDS in the brain. Infection of the brain by human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) is a frequent finding in patients with AIDS (14, 23, 43) and results in neurological manifestations in 20 to 30% of HIV-1-infected individuals. The AIDS dementia complex is the most prominent of these neurological complications, with cognitive, motor and behavioral dysfunctions. Classical hallmarks of AIDS dementia complex are neuron loss, reactive astrocytosis, microgliosis, and myelin pallor (11). The pathogenesis of AIDS dementia complex is unknown, since only a limited number of brain cells are infected by HIV. Current hypotheses indicate that virus-induced mediators are involved in inducing the neurological lesions. Complement is an important antimicrobial defense mechanism of innate immunity. Laminin (925-933) It recognizes a large variety of pathogens and targets Rabbit Polyclonal to BAIAP2L2 Laminin (925-933) them for destruction either directly by formation of a lytic pore or by opsonization and recruitment of phagocytes. The complement system is of special importance in the brain because the elements of adaptive immunity have only limited access due to the blood-brain barrier. Furthermore, astrocytes induce a deactivation of penetrating monocytes-macrophages and T cells (16, 51), thus enhancing the importance of the autonomous complement cascade system in the central nervous system. Therefore, complement activation during HIV infection of the brain might represent a protective defense mechanism by limiting virus spread within the brain and decreasing the viral burden, either directly by viral lysis or indirectly by activation of microglial immune cells by complement activation products like C3a and C5a (33). However, there is also some evidence from other neurological diseases like Alzheimer’s disease and multiple sclerosis that chronic complement activation is associated with brain inflammation and neurodegeneration (10, 22, 31, 39, 49, 52; reviewed in reference 46). Since HIV and HIV-infected cells activate the complement cascade by all three pathways (reviewed in reference 45) and complement activation products harbor a variety of biological functions toward brain cells, it is intriguing to hypothesize that chronic complement activation in the HIV-infected brain may represent an important mediator of virus-induced brain damage. The complement factor C3 is a central protein of the cascade, and its fragments (C3b, iC3b, C3d, and C3a) affect many cellular processes in the brain, such as activation of signaling pathways (30, 35, 36) and modulation of cytokine synthesis (17, 41). In general, all complement proteins can be synthesized by various brain cells, including astrocytes, neurons, microglia, and oligodendrocytes, with astrocytes being the most potent complement producers (13, 32). Although normal synthesis in the brain is low, with C3 concentrations being 300 times lower in the cerebrospinal fluid than in the blood (24), inflammatory cytokines such as gamma interferon (IFN-) and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-) considerably increase complement production, especially of complement factor C3 (4, 15, 40). Furthermore, the mRNA level of C3 was markedly.