Microarray expression analysis of genes involved in innate immune memory in peritoneal macrophages

Immunological memory has been believed to be a feature of the adaptive immune system for long period, but recent reports suggest that the innate immune system also exhibits memory-like reaction. Although evidence of innate immune memory is accumulating, no in vivo experimental data has clearly implicated a molecular mechanism, or even a cell-type, for this phenomenon. In this study of data deposited into Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) under GSE71111, we analyzed the expression profile of peritoneal macrophages isolated from mice pre-administrated with toll-like receptor (TLR) ligands, mimicking pathogen infection. In these macrophages, increased expression of a group of innate immunity-related genes was sustained over a long period of time, and these genes overlapped with ATF7-regulated genes. We conclude that ATF7 plays an important role in innate immune memory in macrophages.