Establishment and analysis of immune functions of intestinal epithelial cell lines aimed at screening immunity-modulating functional foods

肠道经常暴露在共生和致病微生物以及包括食物抗原在内的饮食物质中；因此，肠道有一种独特的免疫系统来对抗或应对它们。位于肠粘膜表面的肠上皮细胞(IECS)在调节肠道免疫系统中起重要作用。因此，分析免疫调节药物和功能食品对IECS免疫功能的影响显得尤为重要。在这项工作中，我们试图建立和分析肠上皮细胞系的免疫功能。我们成功地从胎鼠和成年鼠的小肠和大肠建立了小鼠上皮细胞系。一些免疫调节分子在小肠和大肠上皮中的表达模式分别对应于小和大IEC系。我们还发现，使用这些IEC系，用鞘氨醇-1-磷酸处理可以调节某些细胞因子和趋化因子的mRNA表达和分泌。这些体外模型系统可能被证明有助于详细分析小肠和大肠上皮的免疫调节功能，并用于筛选免疫调节药物和功能食品。

The intestines are constantly exposed to commensal and pathogenic microbes and dietary substances including food antigens ; therefore, intestines have a unique immune system to fight against or to cope with them. Intestinal epithelial cells (IECs), which are located at the surface of intestinal mucosa, play an important role in regulating the intestinal immune system. Thus it would appear that it is important for analysis of the effects of immunity-modulating drugs and functional foods on immune function of IECs. In this work, we try to establish and analyze of immune functions of intestinal epithelial cell lines. We successfully established mouse epithelial cell lines from fetal and adult mouse small and large intestine. Expression pattern of some immune regulatory molecules in small and large intestinal epithelium corresponds to those in small and large IEC lines respectively. We have also found using these IEC lines that treatment with sphingosine-1-phosphate regulates the mRNA expression and secretion of some cytokines and chemokines. These in vitro model systems may prove useful for detailed analysis of the immune regulatory functions of the small and large intestinal epithelia, and for screening immunity-modulating drugs and functional foods.