ArticleThe Journal of experimental medicine2013
Inactivation of the RB family prevents thymus involution and promotes thymic function by direct control of Foxn1 expression.
Article in The Journal of experimental medicine, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 34 papers.
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Who cites it
34 citing papers in PubMed, 67 citations in OpenAlex.
- From Development to Aging: Dynamic Roles of the Thymic Medulla in T Cell Biology.Immunological reviews · 2026Review
- Endogenous thymic regeneration: restoring T cell production following injury.Nature reviews. Immunology · 2025Review
- Insulin-like growth factor 2 as a driving force for exponential expansion and differentiation of the neonatal thymus.Development (Cambridge, England) · 2025Article
- The Ins and Outs of Thymic Epithelial Cell Differentiation and Function.Advances in experimental medicine and biology · 2025Review
- Mechanisms underlying the direct programming of mouse embryonic fibroblasts to thymic epithelial cells by FOXN1.Development (Cambridge, England) · 2024Article
- Recombinant FOXN1 fusion protein increases T cell generation in old mice.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Article
- Article
- Monitoring the Cell Cycle of Tumor Cells in Mouse Models of Human Cancer.Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in medicine · 2023Article
- Effects of PAMK on lncRNA, miRNA, and mRNA expression profiles of thymic epithelial cells.Functional & integrative genomics · 2022Article
- Article
- Redox regulation of age-associated defects in generation and maintenance of T cell self-tolerance and immunity to foreign antigens.Cell reports · 2022Article
- Key Factors for Thymic Function and Development.Frontiers in immunology · 2022Review
- Transcriptional and epigenetic regulation in thymic epithelial cells.Immunological reviews · 2022Review
- Article
- Age-Related Changes in Thymic Central Tolerance.Frontiers in immunology · 2021Review
- CD147 deficiency in T cells prevents thymic involution by inhibiting the EMT process in TECs in the presence of TGFβ.Cellular & molecular immunology · 2021Article
- Thymus Regeneration and Future Challenges.Stem cell reviews and reports · 2020Review
- Postnatal Involution and Counter-Involution of the Thymus.Frontiers in immunology · 2020Review
- Myc controls a distinct transcriptional program in fetal thymic epithelial cells that determines thymus growth.Nature communications · 2019Article
- Both fallopian tube and ovarian surface epithelium are cells-of-origin for high-grade serous ovarian carcinoma.Nature communications · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 5 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Thymic involution during aging is a major cause of decreased production of T cells and reduced immunity. Here we show that inactivation of Rb family genes in young mice prevents thymic involution and results in an enlarged thymus competent for increased production of naive T cells. This phenotype originates from the expansion of functional thymic epithelial cells (TECs). In RB family mutant TECs, increased activity of E2F transcription factors drives increased expression of Foxn1, a central regulator of the thymic epithelium. Increased Foxn1 expression is required for the thymic expansion observed in Rb family mutant mice. Thus, the RB family promotes thymic involution and controls T cell production via a bone marrow-independent mechanism, identifying a novel pathway to target to increase thymic function in patients.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.