ER stress activation in the intestinal mucosa but not in mesenteric adipose tissue is associated with inflammation in Crohn’s disease patients

Abstract

Chronic/abnormal activation of endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress is linked to the exacerbation of the inflammatory process and has been recently linked to Crohn’s disease (CD) pathophysiology. We investigated the intestinal mucosa and the mesenteric adipose tissue (MAT) collected from CD patients with active disease (CD group) and from non-IBD patients (CTR group) to study ER stress activation and to address tissue-specific modulation in CD. The intestinal mucosa of CD patients showed an upregulation in the expression of ER stress related genes, including ATF3, DNAJC3, STC2, DDIT3, CALR, HSPA5 and HSP90B1. Results showed that EIF2AK3 gene was upregulated, along with increased protein expression of p-eIF2α and p-eIF2α/eIF2α ratio. Additionally, ERN1 gene expression was upregulated, along with an increased spliced/activated form sXBP1 protein. Despite the upregulation of ATF6 gene expression in the intestinal mucosa of CD patients, no differences were found in ATF6 protein expression. Lastly, the analysis of MAT revealed unchanged levels of ER stress markers along with no differences in the activation of UPR. However, chaperone gene expression was modulated in the MAT of CD patients. To conclude, our results address tissue-specific differences in UPR activation in CD and point the ER stress as an important pro-inflammatory mechanism in CD, specifically in the intestinal mucosa.