• Hiroyuki Oshiumi, Miwa Sasai, Kyoko Shida, Takashi Fujita, Misako Matsumoto, and Tsukasa Seya.
• Department of Immunology, Osaka Medical Center for Cancer and Cardiovascular Diseases, Higashinari-ku, Osaka 537-8511, Japan.
• J. Biol. Chem. 2003 Dec 12; 278 (50): 49751-62.

AbstractLipopolysaccharide (LPS) is an agonist for Toll-like receptor (TLR) 4 and expresses many genes including NF-kappaB- and interferon regulatory factor (IRF)-3/IFN-inducible genes in macrophages and dendritic cells (DCs). TICAM-1/TRIF was identified as an adapter that facilitates activation of IRF-3 followed by expression of interferon (IFN)-beta genes in TLR3 signaling, but TICAM-1 does not directly bind TLR4. Although MyD88 and Mal/TIRAP adapters functions downstream of TLR4, DC maturation and IFN-beta induction are independent of MyD88 and Mal/TIRAP. In this investigation, we report the identification of a novel adapter, TICAM-2, that physically bridges TLR4 and TICAM-1 and functionally transmits LPS-TLR4 signaling to TICAM-1, which in turn activates IRF-3. In its structural features, TICAM-2 resembled Mal/TIRAP, an adapter that links TLR2/4 and MyD88. However, TICAM-2 per se exhibited minimal ability to activate NF-kappaB and the IFN-beta promoter. Hence, in LPS signaling TLR4 recruits two types of adapters, TIRAP and TICAM-2, to its cytoplasmic domain that are indirectly connected to two effective adapters, MyD88 and TICAM-1, respectively. We conclude that for LPS-TLR4-mediated activation of IFN-beta, the adapter complex of TICAM-2 and TICAM-1 plays a crucial role. This results in the construction of MyD88-dependent and -independent pathways separately downstream of the two distinct adapters.

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