Anti-CD20 treatment attenuates Th2 cell responses: implications for the role of lung follicular mature B cells in the asthmatic mice

• DOI: 10.1007/s00011-023-01847-4
• Publication Date: 2024-02-12T15:04:52Z
• Authors: Jilong He; Jingling Li; Qibin Lin; Haiyang Ni; Sisi Huang; Hong Cheng; Xuhong Ding; Yi Huang; Hongying Yu; Yaqing Xu; Hanxiang Nie
• Keywords: Adoptive Cell Transfer

B cells were believed to act as antigen-presenting cells (APCs) to promote T helper type 2 (Th2) cell responses. However, the role of lung B cells and its subpopulations in Th2 cell responses in asthma remains unclear.We leveraged an anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody (mAb) treatment that has been shown to selectively deplete B cells in mice and investigated whether this treatment modulates Th2 cell responses and this modulation is related to lung follicular mature (FM) B cells in a murine model of asthma.We used a house dust mite (HDM)-induced asthma mouse model and found that anti-CD20 mAb treatment attenuates Th2 cell responses. Meanwhile, anti-CD20 mAb treatment did dramatically reduce the number of B cells, especially FM B cells in the lungs, but did not impact the frequency of other immune cell types, including lung T cells, dendritic cells, natural killer cells, and regulatory T cells in wild-type mice. Moreover, we found that the suppressive effect of anti-CD20 mAb treatment on Th2 cell responses could be reversed upon adoptive transfer of lung FM B cells, but not lung CD19+ B cells without FM B cells in asthmatic mice.These findings reveal that anti-CD20 mAb treatment alleviates Th2 cell responses, possibly by depleting lung FM B cells in a Th2-driven asthma model. This implies a potential therapeutic approach for asthma treatment through the targeting of lung FM B cells.