Immunology Panel

Interleukins are a large group of small signaling peptides, or cytokines, involved in the function of white blood cells.

This panel covers several major families of interleukins and their corresponding receptors, including:

• IL1B – promotes inflammation
• IL2 – regulates and promotes the differentiation of T cells into regulatory, effector and memory T cells
• IL4 and IL13 – promotes the proliferation of activated helper T cells and B cells
• IL7R – promotes the early maturation of lymphoid cells and genetic recombination
• IL8 – recruits white blood cells to the site of inflammation

Proinflammatory cytokines are small peptides that promote inflammation in the innate immune response.

This panel covers two major proinflammatory cytokines:

• IL1B – produced primarily by macrophages, monocytes and endothelial cells to upregulate the inflammatory response
• TNF – (tumor necrosis factor) formerly known as TNF alpha, mediates the inflammatory response

Cell surface proteins often help the immune system to distinguish “self” from “non-self” in addition to acting as receptors.

This panel covers some major surface proteins:

• CD247 – also known as the T-cell receptor T3 zeta chain, is a component of the T-cell receptor-CD3 complex that recognizes fragments of antigen bound to the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) on antigen-presenting cells (APC)
• CD40 – is a surface protein on antigen-presenting cells that binds to CD154 (CD40L) on helper T cells causing their activation
• CD44 – involved in cell-cell adhesion and is used, along with CD25, to identity early differentiated T cells in the thymus

Chemokines are cytokines that induce chemotaxis, or movement of cells in response to a chemical stimulus.

This panel covers a few chemokines:

• IL8 – causes macrophage migration to the site of inflammation
• CXCR3 – a chemokine receptor that regulates leukocyte trafficking, especially of Th1 cells

The tumor necrosis factor superfamily of proteins are cytokines initially observed to cause apoptosis.

This panel’s tumor necrosis factors and receptors:

• TNFRSF25 – also known as death receptor 3, mediates apoptosis
• TNFRS10C – antagonistic receptor that protects cells from apoptosis
• TNF – multifunctional proinflammatory cytokine

Matrixins are enzymes that break down extracellular matrix proteins such as collagen.

This panel covers a few matrixins:

• MMP1 – matrix metalloproteinase-1 breaks down interstitial collegens, type I, II, III
• MMP3 – matrix metalloproteinase-3 also known as stromelysin-1 degrades various extracellular matrix proteins and activates other MMPs
• MMP13 – matrix metalloproteinase-13 also known as collagenase 3 participates in collagen degradation

There are many genes related to regulatory T-cell (Treg) differentiation and function. See EpigenDx’s FOXP3 Methylation Panel for more details.

Can’t find your gene of interest? Contact us! EpigenDx has over seven thousand individually pre-validated assays, most of which have not yet been posted on this website. Please let us know if you cannot find what you are looking for.