Diminished induction of skin fibrosis in mice with MCP-1 deficiency

Scar and fibrosis are often the end result of mechanical injury and inflammatory diseases. One chemokine that is repeatedly linked to fibrotic responses is monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1). We utilized a murine fibrosis model that produces dermal lesions similar to scleroderma to evaluate collagen fibrillogenesis in the absence of MCP-1. Dermal fibrosis was induced by subcutaneous injection of bleomycin into the dorsal skin of MCP-1-/- and wild-type C57BL/6 mice. After 4 weeks of daily injections, bleomycin treatment led to thickened collagen bundles with robust inflammation in the lesional dermis of wild-type mice. In contrast, the lesional skin of MCP-1-/- mice exhibited a dermal architecture similar to phosphate-buffered saline (PBS)-injected control and normal skin, with few inflammatory cells. Ultrastructural analysis of the lesional dermis from bleomycin-injected wild-type mice revealed markedly abnormal arrangement of collagen fibrils, with normal large diameter collagen fibrils replaced by small collagen fibrils of 41.5 nm. In comparison, the dermis of bleomycin-injected MCP-1-/- mice displayed a uniform pattern of fibril diameters that was similar to normal skin (average diameter 76.7 nm). The findings implicate MCP-1 as a key determinant in the development of skin fibrosis induced by bleomycin, and suggest that MCP-1 may influence collagen fiber formation in vivo.