Does JAM-A play a role in leukocyte transmigration in the liver?
The data on leukocyte transmigration have shown that the postischemic increase in the number of transmigrated CD45+ cells (total leukocytes) was about 6-fold higher than that of transmigrated neutrophils, whereas in the sham-operated group the numbers of transmigrated CD45+ and esterase-positive cells were comparable. We conclude from this result that hepatic I/R induces transmigration not only of neutrophils but also of other leukocyte subsets. There is a growing body of evidence that T cells, in addition to neutrophils, play a critical role in the manifestation of I/R injury of the liver.29,30,36 Therefore, we extended the differentiation of subsets of emigrated leukocytes and performed immunostaining for T cells. Our results show that hepatic I/R clearly induced T-cell transmigration already during the first 2 hours of reperfusion. In JAM-A-/- mice, the I/R-induced increase in transmigration of total leukocytes was reduced by approximately 45%. Since the elevated transmigration of T
