Role of proteinkinase C and phosphatidylinositol metabolism in lipopeptide-induced leukocyte activation as signal transducing mechanism.

Synthetic lipopeptides are potent B-lymphocyte and macrophage activators. The role of phosphatidylinositol metabolism and proteinkinase C in lipopeptide induced leukocyte activation were investigated. In murine B-lymphocytes and in bone marrow derived macrophages, lipopeptide failed to induce phosphatidylinositol breakdown, whereas in the macrophage cell line P388D1 formation of inositolphosphates was increased. Translocation of proteinkinase C from a cytosolic to a membrane compartment was only observed in the cell line P388D1 indicating that in the other cells tested lipopeptide acts via different signal transduction pathways.