Several mouse models of psoriasis including drug-induced models (topical application of imiquimod to the skin) and genetically engineered mice (constitutive activation of epidermal STAT3, epidermal deletion of JunB/c-Jun, and epidermal overexpression of Tie2) have been used to study the pathophysiology of the disease; however such models cannot fully recapitulate all molecular and cellular pathways occurring in human psoriasis.
Herein, we demonstrate the efficacy of an unbiased proteomics screening approach for studying protein expression changes in the KC-Tie2psoriasis mouse model, identifying multiple protein expression changes in the mouse and validating these changes in human psoriasis.
Indeed, we found that psoriasis patients have increased monocyte aggregation among circulating PBMCs, which is recapitulated in the KC-Tie2 murine model of psoriasis.
In this study, whole-genome transcriptional profiling is used to compare gene expression patterns manifested by human psoriatic skin lesions with those that occur in five psoriasis mouse models (K5-Tie2, imiquimod, K14-AREG, K5-Stat3C and K5-TGFbeta1).
Therefore, confining Tie2 overexpression solely to keratinocytes results in a mouse model that meets the clinical, histological, immunophenotypic, biochemical, and pharmacological criteria required for an animal model of human psoriasis.
Recently, a role for the angiopoietin signaling system in psoriasis has been suggested by studies that demonstrate an up-regulation of the tyrosine kinase receptor Tie2 (also known as Tek) as well as angiopoietin-1 and angiopoietin-2 in human psoriatic lesions.