Molecular Info®

Molecular Info® Copy Right © 2001 Institute of Molecular Development LLC

Interleukin-12 suppresses ultraviolet radiation-induced apoptosis by inducing DNA repair. Agatha Schwarz, Sonja Ständer, Mark Berneburg, Markus Böhm, Dagmar Kulms, Harry van Steeg, Karin Grosse-Heitmeyer, Jean Krutmann and Thomas Schwarz The Nature Cell Biology, December 2001. Induction of apoptosis of keratinocytes by ultraviolet (UV) radiation is a protective phenomenon relevant in limiting the survival of cells with irreparable DNA damage. Changes in UV-induced apoptosis may have significant impact on photocarcinogenesis. The immunomodulatory cytokine IL-12 suppresses UV-mediated apoptosis of keratinocytes. IL-12 caused a remarkable reduction in UV-specific DNA lesions which was due to induction of DNA repair. In accordance with this, IL-12 induced the expression of particular components of the nucleotide-excision repair complex. These results suggests that cytokines can protect cells from apoptosis induced by DNA-damaging UV radiation by inducing DNA repair, and that nucleotide-excision repair can be manipulated by cytokines.