Di- and trimeric biological switches made of nanobody-cytokine receptor fusion proteins simulate IL-23 signaling

Cytokine-induced signal transduction is executed by natural biological switches, which among many others control immune related processes. To construct a biological device, that simulates cytokine signaling, we utilized nanobodies to generate synthetic cytokine receptors (SyCyR). High affinity GFP- and mCherry-nanobodies were selected and extracellularly fused to trans-membrane and intracellular domains of IL-23 cytokine receptors. Soluble homo- and heterodimeric GFP:mCherry fusion proteins served as SyCyR ligands. Heterodimeric GFP-mCherry and homodimeric GFP fusion proteins efficiently phenocopied IL-23 signal transduction, respectively, as demonstrated by STAT3-, ERK- and Akt-activation, SOCS3 expression and transcriptome profiling. Interestingly, the homodimeric GFP fusion protein induced IL-23 receptor homo-dimerization and activation of IL-23-like signal transduction

32

Engelowski E, Schneider A, Franke M, Xu H, Clemen R, Lang A, Baran P, Binsch C, Knebel B, Al-Hasani H, Moll JM, Floß DM, Lang PA, Scheller J