MARCO, an innate activation marker of macrophages, is a class A scavenger receptor for Neisseria meningitidis

Subhankar Mukhopadhyay, Yunying Chen, Marko Sankala, Leanne Peiser, Timo Pikkarainen, Georg Kraal, Karl Tryggvason, Siamon Gordon*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal Article peer-review

73 Scopus citations

Abstract

The scavenger receptor-A I/II (SR-A) and macrophage receptor with collagenous domain (MARCO) share a common domain organisation and ligand repertoire, including selected polyanions and gram-positive and -negative organisms, but differ in fine specificity of ligand binding, tissue distribution and regulation. Neisseria meningitidis (NM) is a selective ligand for SR-A, but there is evidence for an additional SR-A-independent, polyanion-sensitive component for NM recognition. We therefore studied the relative contribution of MARCO and SR-A to binding of NM by resident and elicited peritoneal macrophages obtained from MARCO-/-, SR-A-/- and SR-A-MARCO-/- mice. Results confirmed that both mouse and human MARCO are able to bind NM independently of NM LPS. MARCO and SR-A contributed independently to NM binding, correlating with their expression levels in different cell populations, but neither of these two molecules was required for release of TNF-α and nitric oxide. We propose that the TLR-dependent induction of MARCO by innate immune stimulation enhances recognition and uptake of pathogenic organisms such as NM, thus contributing to host defence against infection.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)940-949
Number of pages10
JournalEuropean Journal of Immunology
Volume36
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - 04 2006
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • Bacterial infection
  • Innate immunity
  • Macrophage
  • Phagocytosis

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