Formation of tight junctions in epithelial cells. I. Induction by proteases in a human colon carcinoma cell line.

The experimental modulation of tight junctions (TJ) was studied in the human adenocarcinoma cell line HT 29 by freeze-fracture electron microscopy. The cell line has virtually no TJ when grown in culture. TJ could be induced by mild treatment with a variety of endopeptidases (trypsin, chymotrypsin, collagenase, elastase, plasmin, thrombin, papain, and pronase). Pronase induced the formation of TJ at low (but not at high) concentrations. All exopeptidases studied were unable to induce the formation of TJ. At 0 degree C the trypsin-induced formation of TJ was greatly slowed down although not entirely inhibited. However, when cells were briefly treated with trypsin at 0 degree C and subsequently transferred to 37 degrees C in the presence of protease inhibitors, TJ were rapidly assembled. Thus an induction phase at low temperature and an assembly phase at high temperature could be experimentally separated. When cells were briefly trypsinized at 0 degrees and subsequently kept at 0 degree C without trypsin for several hours, TJ still formed abundantly upon incubation at 37 degrees C. It appears therefore that the effect produced by the protease is retained for long periods in the cold.