No abstract

The innate immune system relies on its capacity to rapidly detect invading pathogenic microbes as foreign and to eliminate them. The discovery of Toll-like receptors (TLRs) provided a class of membrane receptors that sense extracellular microbes and trigger antipathogen signaling cascades. More recently, intracellular microbial sensors have been identified, including NOD-like receptors (NLRs). Some of the NLRs also sense nonmicrobial danger signals and form large cytoplasmic complexes called inflammasomes that link the sensing of microbial products and metabolic stress to the proteolytic activation of the proinflammatory cytokines IL-1beta and IL-18. The NALP3 inflammasome has been associated with several autoinflammatory conditions including gout. Likewise, the NALP3 inflammasome is a crucial element in the adjuvant effect of aluminum and can direct a humoral adaptive immune response. In this review, we discuss the role of NLRs, and in particular the inflammasomes, in the recognition of microbial and danger components and the role they play in health and disease.

Generation of Interleukin (IL)-1beta via cleavage of its proform requires the activity of caspase-1 (and caspase-11 in mice), but the mechanism involved in the activation of the proinflammatory caspases remains elusive. Here we report the identification of a caspase-activating complex that we call the inflammasome. The inflammasome comprises caspase-1, caspase-5, Pycard/Asc, and NALP1, a Pyrin domain-containing protein sharing structural homology with NODs. Using a cell-free system, we show that proinflammatory caspase activation and proIL-1beta processing is lost upon prior immunodepletion of Pycard. Moreover, expression of a dominant-negative form of Pycard in differentiated THP-1 cells blocks proIL-1beta maturation and activation of inflammatory caspases induced by LPS in vivo. Thus, the inflammasome constitutes an important arm of the innate immunity.

Mutations within the NALP3/cryopyrin/CIAS1 gene are responsible for three autoinflammatory disorders: Muckle-Wells syndrome, familial cold autoinflammatory syndrome, and CINCA. The NALP3 protein is homologous to NALP1, which is a component of the inflammasome, a molecular platform that activates the proinflammatory caspases-1 and -5. NALP3 (and other members of the NALP family) lacks the C-terminal, CARD-containing sequence of NALP1, and its role in caspase activation is unclear. Here, we report that NALP2 and NALP3 associate with ASC, the CARD-containing protein Cardinal, and caspase-1 (but not caspase-5), thereby forming an inflammasome with high proIL-1beta-processing activity. Macrophages from Muckle-Wells patients spontaneously secrete active IL-1beta. Increased inflammasome activity is therefore likely to be the molecular basis of the symptoms associated with NALP3-dependent autoinflammatory disorders.

No abstract

Sensors of pathogens, such as Toll-like receptors (TLRs), detect microbes to activate transcriptional programs that orchestrate adaptive responses to specific insults. Here we report that TLR4 and TLR2 specifically activated the endoplasmic reticulum (ER)-stress sensor kinase IRE1α and its downstream target, the transcription factor XBP1. Previously described XBP1 ER stress target genes were not induced by TLR signaling. Instead, TLR-activated XBP1 was required for optimal and sustained production of proinflammatory cytokines in macrophages. Consistent with this finding, IRE1α activation by ER-stress synergized with TLR activation for cytokine production. Moreover, XBP1 deficiency markedly increased bacterial burden in animals infected with the TLR2-activating human pathogen Francisella tularensis. Our findings uncover an unsuspected critical new function for the XBP1 transcription factor in mammalian host defenses.

Stimulation of Toll-like receptors (TLRs) initiates potent innate immune responses through Toll-interleukin 1 receptor (TIR) domain-containing adaptors such as MyD88 and Trif. Analysis of Trif-deficient mice has shown that TLR3-dependent activation of the transcription factor NF-kappa B by the TLR3 ligand double-stranded RNA is Trif dependent. Here we investigated the 'downstream' signaling events that regulate TLR3-dependent Trif-induced NF-kappa B activation. Trif recruited the kinases receptor interacting protein (RIP)-1 and RIP3 through its RIP homotypic interaction motif. In the absence of RIP1, TLR3-mediated signals activating NF-kappa B, but not the kinase JNK or interferon-beta, were abolished, suggesting that RIP1 mediates Trif-induced NF-kappa B activation. In contrast, the presence of RIP3 negatively regulated the Trif-RIP1-induced NF-kappa B pathway. Therefore, in contrast to other TLRs, which use interleukin 1 receptor-associated kinase (IRAK) proteins to activate NF-kappa B, TLR 3-induced NF-kappa B activation is dependent on RIP kinases.

Fifteen years have passed since the cloning and characterization of the interleukin-1b-converting enzyme (ICE/caspase-1), the first identified member of a family of proteases currently known as caspases. Caspase-1 is the prototypical member of a subclass of caspases involved in cytokine maturation termed inflammatory caspases that also include caspase-4 caspase -5, caspase -11 and caspase -12. Efforts to elucidate the molecular mechanisms involved in the activation of these proteases have uncovered an important role for the NLR family members, NALPs, NAIP and IPAF. These proteins promote the assembly of multiprotein complexes termed inflammasomes, which are required for activation of inflammatory caspases. This article will review some evolutionary aspects, biochemical evidences and genetic studies, underlining the role of inflammasomes and inflammatory caspases in innate immunity against pathogens, autoinflammatory syndromes and in the biology of reproduction. Inflammatory CaspasesThe history of caspases began with the identification of an aspartate-specific protease activity involved in the conversion of the 31 kDa proIL-1b precursor to its active 17 kDa biologically active form, 1,2 and the identification of caspase-1 as the protease responsible for proIL-1b maturation. 3,4 The subsequent discovery of ced-3, that shares similarities with caspase-1 and which is involved in programmed cell death (PCD) in Caenorhabditis elegans, suggested that caspases might play fundamental roles in apoptosis. 5 As reviewed in the papers accompanying this issue of Cell Death and Differentiation, the role of apoptotic caspases in C. elegans and in vertebrates is crucial and deal with many facets of cell biology, development and diseases. In this review, we will focus on a subset of caspases present only in vertebrates and known as inflammatory caspases.Inflammatory caspases (also known as group I caspases) are encoded by three main genes in humans caspase-1, caspase-4 and caspase-5 and three main genes in mouse, caspase-1, caspase-11 and caspase-12. 6,7 In mammals, these caspases are characterized by the presence of a CARD domain at the N-terminus (Figure 1a). Human, chimp and mouse inflammatory caspases share significant similarity and are organized in a single locus (Figure 1c). Phylogenetic analysis of the conserved CARD domain suggests that the inflammatory caspases can be separated in evolutionaryrelated clusters (Figure 1b). The caspase-1 cluster contains caspase-1 and four other genes encoding decoy caspases: cop, inca1, inca2 and iceberg. These decoy caspase-1-like genes are absent in the mouse genome, suggesting that they have arisen recently by duplication of caspase-1. Although human and mouse caspase-1 are likely orthologues, sequence analysis suggests that human caspase-4 and caspase-5 have originated from a duplication of caspase-11. 7 However, the human caspase-12 gene, which in the chimp genome contains an SHG box important for it enzymatic activity, 8 evolved towards an enzymatically inactive form at some stage...