Blood, Vol. 92 No. 1 (July 1), 1998:
pp. 339-340
CORRESPONDENCE
To GpIb or not to GpIb
 |
LETTER |
To the Editor:
The recent article by Perrault et al1 calls into question
the entire series of observations that have been made by
us2-5 and by others6 since 1988 relating to the
endothelial glycoprotein (Gp) Ib complex. It is an irony of timing that
their manuscript was accepted for publication 2 weeks before our
article appeared in Blood,7 demonstrating the
involvement of GpIb
in endothelial cell (EC) attachment to von
Willebrand factor (vWF), particularly after exposure to the combination
of tumor necrosis factor-
(TNF-
) and interferon-
(IFN-
),
and was published only 2 weeks before our subsequent publication, again
in Blood, demonstrating the presence of all four components of
the GpIb complex on the surface of cultured EC and in vessels in
vivo.8
Perrault et al state that they were unable to identify either GpIb
message or surface protein in EC, using Northern blotting of poly A+
mRNA (even after TNF-
treatment) and flow cytometry with several
monoclonal antibodies (MoAbs) to GpIb
, respectively. They
furthermore state that adhesion to vWF could not be inhibited by MoAbs
to GpIb
. The reason for the discrepancy between their results and
ours is difficult to ascertain. As already stated, the presence of
GpIb
in/on EC, and its involvement in EC adhesion to vWF, has been
reported by more than one laboratory. Moreover, the GpIb complex has
been identified in EC by a large number of techniques
Northern
blotting; cloning of EC GpIb
, GpIb
, and GpIX, with complete
sequencing of the latter two; surface labeling of HUVEC and adult human
EC by MoAbs to GpIb
, GpIX, and GpV and by polyclonal antibodies to
GpIb
and GpIb
; and Western blotting of EC extracts with MoAbs
and/or polyclonal antibodies to all four chains. One possible
explanation for the negative results of Perrault et al with antibody
probes is our observation that, even though several GpIb
MoAbs
possess attachment-inhibiting ability, very few react strongly with EC
by flow cytometry. With regard to their negative Northern blotting
data, it appears that insufficient polyA+ mRNA may have been used to
detect the admittedly weak GpIb
signal in untreated human umbilical
vein endothelial cells. The lack of reaction after cytokine treatment
is more difficult to explain, but it would have been
helpful to see the degree of upregulation of ICAM-1 mRNA in their
cultures.
The involvement of the EC GpIb complex in adhesion to vWF, both in the
absence of and, to a greater extent, in the presence of cytokines, has
been demonstrated by inhibition studies with two different MoAbs to
GpIb
and with the vWF-A1 fragment, containing the GpIb
binding
domain.7 The lack of inhibitory effect on EC attachment of
MoAbs to GpIb
observed by Perrault et al may perhaps be related to
the relatively low attachment they observed (40%, v 65%-70%
which we and most others obtain) and/or to the apparent absence
of protease inhibitors and the low EDTA concentration of their lifting
buffer. Finally, Perrault et al state that conflicting data concerning
the expression of GpIb
mRNA in endothelial cells after stimulation
with TNF-
have been reported, and refer to three of our
publications. However, there is no disagreement in the results
presented in these three publications, all of which report upregulation
of GpIb
by TNF-
. Furthermore, they misquote us7
and DeFilippi et al9 when they state that TNF-
alone downregulates
v
3
both we and DeFilippi
clearly indicate that only the combination of TNF-
and
IFN-
downregulates
v
3.
With regard to our divergent observations concerning the GpIb complex
in EC, we look forward to a planned exchange of reagents with Perrault
et al.
Sandor S. Shapiro
Barbara A. Konkle
Dorothy A. Beacham
Cardeza Foundation for Hematologic Research
Division of
Hematology
Jefferson Medical College
Philadelphia, PA
 |
REFERENCES |
1.
Perrault C,
Lankhof H,
Pidard D,
Kerbiriou-Nabias D,
Sixma JJ,
Meyer D,
Baruch D:
Relative importance of the glycoprotein Ib-binding domain and the RGD sequence of von Willebrand factor for its interaction with endothelial cells.
Blood
90:2335,
1997[Abstract/Free Full Text]
2.
Sprandio JD,
Shapiro SS,
Thiagarajan P,
McCord S:
Cultured human umbilical vein endothelial cells contain a membrane glycoprotein immunologically related to platelet glycoprotein Ib.
Blood
71:234,
1988[Abstract]
3.
Konkle BA,
Shapiro SS,
Asch AS,
Nachman RL:
Cytokine-enhanced expression of glycoprotein Ib
in human endothelium.
J Biol Chem
265:19833,
1990[Abstract/Free Full Text]
4.
Rajagopalan V,
Essex DW,
Shapiro SS,
Konkle BA:
Tumor necrosis factor
modulation of glycoprotein Ib
expression in human endothelial cells and erythroleukemia cells.
Blood
80:153,
1992[Abstract]
5.
Kelly MD,
Essex DW,
Shapiro SS,
Meloni FJ,
Druck R,
Huebner K,
Konkle BA:
Complementary DNA cloning of the alternatively expressed endothelial cell glycoprotein Ib
(GP Ib
) and localization of the GP Ib
gene to chromosome 22.
J Clin Invest
93:2417,
1994[Medline]
[Order article via Infotrieve]
6.
Asch AS,
Adelman B,
Fujimoto M,
Nachman RL:
Identification and isolation of a platelet GPIb-like protein in human umbilical vein endothelial cells and bovine aortic smooth muscle cells.
J Clin Invest
81:1600,
1988[Medline]
[Order article via Infotrieve]
7.
Beacham DA,
Tran L-P,
Shapiro SS:
Cytokine treatment of endothelial cells increases glycoprotein Ib
-dependent adhesion to von Willebrand factor.
Blood
89:4071,
1997[Abstract/Free Full Text]
8.
Wu G,
Essex DW,
Meloni FJ,
Takafuta T,
Fujimura K,
Konkle BA,
Shapiro SS:
Human endothelial cells in culture and in vivo express on their surface all four components of the glycoprotein Ib/IX/V complex.
Blood
90:2660,
1997[Abstract/Free Full Text]
9.
DeFilippi P,
Truffa G,
Stefanuto F,
Altruda F,
Silengo L,
Tarone G:
Tumor necrosis factor
and interferon
modulate the expression of the vitronectin receptor (integrin
3) in human endothelial cells.
J Biol Chem
266:7638,
1991[Abstract/Free Full Text]
 |
RESPONSE |
We thank Dr Shapiro and his colleagues for their interest in our study
reporting on EC adhesion to vWF under static conditions.1 Our purpose for many years has been to address the issue of a vWF
interaction with the endothelial GPIb-V-IX complex from a vWF-oriented
point of view. In a prior study, we used vWF proteolytic fragments and
MoAbs against functional domains of vWF,2 whereas more
recently we used mutated recombinant vWF (r-vWF) and took into
consideration the importance of cell stimulation by
TNF-
.1 Our results unequivocally show that, under our
experimental conditions, cultured EC adhere to vWF in an
v
3-dependent manner and suggest the absence of cooperativity
between vWF RGD-containing region and an additional site of the A1
domain. We found quite interesting that Beacham et al agree with us
upon the lack of inhibitory effect on EC adhesion to vWF by the
anti-GPIb
MoAb 6D1.3,4 However, we find more puzzling
the discrepancy concerning the effect of MoAb AS-7, kindly donated to
us by Dr Jonathan Miller,5 which has been reported as an
inhibitor of EC adhesion to vWF or its RGD mutant,3,4 but
which we found devoid of inhibitory effect on EC adhesion to WT-rvWF or
to RGGS-rvWF. Dr Shapiro and his colleagues state that a possible
explanation for this discrepancy is to be found in the "relatively
low attachment" that we obtain. However, we disagree that our values
can be directly compared with their data since we express adhesion as a
percentage of total cell number added to the well, and they report
adhesion as percent of a reference value arbitrarily set to 100%.
Given the results, the level of expression of endothelial GPIb
protein and mRNA emerged as a necessary question to be assessed in our
experimental conditions. We reported that these levels remained
undetectable by a variety of techniques (flow cytometry, immunoprecipitation, and Northern blot) despite the use of stimulation conditions supposed to result in a significant increased level of
GPIb
, which indeed were efficient as indicated by an increase in
ICAM-1 expression. We acknowledge that flow cytometry has a limit of
detection of ~500 molecules per cell which could explain our failure
to detect low amounts of a weakly expressed receptor. However, we also
used indirect immunofluorescence without further success
(personal unpublished data, March 1997). This is even more
puzzling when considering the recently reported high number of GPIb
copies per EC (>300,000 per apparently unactivated cell), which could
not have escaped our range of sensitivity.6 As outlined by
Dr Shapiro and his colleagues in the above letter, there is a general
agreement that untreated EC express a weak mRNA signal for GPIb
.
Since expression of the endothelial GPIb-V-IX complex was not the main
focus of our study, we decided not to continue along this line, and
stated that GPIb
is not expressed to detectable levels in our EC
cultures, whether activated or not. Clearly, our present findings do
not call into question the observations of Shapiro and colleagues
concerning the identification of endothelial GPIb
, GPV, and
GPIX.6,7
We are aware that Dr Shapiro and his coworkers have actually raised
most observations reporting on the presence of the GPIb-V-IX complex on
EC, with the exception of a report that included observations on smooth
muscle cells.8 Based on their more recent results (that
were indeed published 2 weeks after acceptance of our manuscript, and
which we could thus not have misquoted4) it appears
somewhat surprising that Dr Shapiro and his colleagues express their
apparent disagreement with our findings. Indeed, they clearly agree
with us that the function of GPIb
as a vWF receptor can be best
evidenced when
v
3 expression is downregulated, and is strongly
dependent on a balance between both receptors.4 Therefore,
the most likely explanation for the discrepancy between both functional
studies is that our results experimentally favor the
v
3-dependent pathway, whereas their results do not. An
interesting objective will be to find physiopathological conditions
resulting both in a downregulation of
v
3 and an increased
GPIb-dependent adhesion to vWF.
Dominique Baruch
Daniéle Kerbiriou-Nabias
Dominique Meyer
Christelle Perrault
INSERM U143
Hopital de Bicetre
Bicetre,
France
Dominique Pidard
Unité Associée Institut
Pasteur/INSERM U285
Institut Pasteur
Paris, France
Jan Sixma
Department of Hematology
University Hospital
Utrecht,
The Netherlands
 |
REFERENCES |
1.
Perrault C,
Lankhof H,
Pidard D,
Kerbiriou-Nabias D,
Sixma JJ,
Meyer D,
Baruch D:
Relative importance of the glycoprotein Ib-binding domain and the RGD sequence of von Willebrand factor for its interaction with endothelial cells.
Blood
90:2335,
1997[Abstract/Free Full Text]
2.
Denis C,
Williams JA,
Lu X,
Meyer D,
Baruch D:
Solid-phase von Willebrand factor contains a conformationally active RGD motif that mediates endothelial cell adhesion through the
v
3 receptor.
Blood
82:3622,
1993[Abstract]
3.
Beacham DA,
Cruz MA,
Handin RI:
Glycoprotein Ib can mediate endothelial cell attachment to a von Willebrand factor substratum.
Thromb Haemost
73:309,
1995[Medline]
[Order article via Infotrieve]
4.
Beacham DA,
Tran LP,
Shapiro SS:
Cytokine treatment of endothelial cells increases glycoprotein Ib
-dependent adhesion to von Willebrand factor.
Blood
89:4071,
1997[Abstract/Free Full Text]
5.
Miller JL,
Hustad KO,
Kupinski JM,
Lyle VA,
Kunicki TJ:
Increased platelet sensitivity to ristocetin is predicted by the binding characteristics of a GPIb/IX determinant.
Br J Haematol
74:313,
1990[Medline]
[Order article via Infotrieve]
6.
Wu G,
Essex DW,
Meloni FJ,
Takafuta T,
Fujimura K,
Konkle BA,
Shapiro SS:
Human endothelial cells in culture and in vivo express on their surface all four components of the glycoprotein Ib/IX/V complex.
Blood
90:2660,
1997[Abstract/Free Full Text]
7.
Kelly MD,
Essex DW,
Shapiro SS,
Meloni FJ,
Druck R,
Huebner K,
Konkle BA:
Complementary DNA cloning of the alternatively expressed endothelial cell glycoprotein Ib
(GP Ib
) and localization of the GP Ib
gene to chromosome 22.
J Clin Invest
93:2417,
1994[Medline]
[Order article via Infotrieve]
8.
Asch AS,
Adelman B,
Fujimoto M,
Nachman RL:
Identification and isolation of a platelet GPIb-like protein in human umbilical vein endothelial cells and bovine aortic smooth muscle cells.
J Clin Invest
81:1600,
1988[Medline]
[Order article via Infotrieve]