Interleukin-1 inhibits thyrotrophin-induced human thyroglobulin gene expression

Abstract

The regulation of thyroglobulin (Tg) and its specific mRNA by interluekin-1 (IL-1) in cultured human thyrocytes was investigated. Specific binding of ¹²⁵I-labelled IL-1 on thyrocytes was confirmed by solid-phase binding assay. Thyrocytes dispersed from Graves' thyroid tissues were incubated with TSH with or without recombinant human IL-1. TSH stimulated Tg release from cultured human thyrocytes in a dose- and time-dependent manner. Both IL-1α and β inhibited TSH-induced Tg release at concentrations ranging from 0·01 to 10 U/ml. The suppressive activities of IL-1α and β were similar. They did not alter the basal level of Tg release. Unstimulated human thyrocytes did not contain any detectable Tg mRNA, but TSH-stimulated thyrocytes expressed a single species of Tg mRNA (8·5 kb). Both IL-lα and β inhibited TSH-induced Tg mRNA in a dose-responsive manner. IL-1 (10 U/ml) caused maximal suppression of TSH-induced Tg mRNA to nearly basal levels. In contrast, the γ-actin mRNA hybridization signal was not altered in control or treated cells. Furthermore, IL-1 stimulated [³H]thymidine uptake into thyrocyte DNA. These results demonstrate that IL-1 directly inhibits TSH-induced Tg gene expression and provide further support for a functional role of IL-1 as a local modulator of thyroid hormone synthesis. Journal of Endocrinology (1989) 122, 177–183