Transgenic Mouse Models for Studying Dendritic Cells

The following 6- to 12-week-old mice were used in this study. C57BL/6 mice (Japan Clea), B6.Cg-Tg(Itgax-cre)1-1Reiz/J mice (31 (link)) (CD11c-Cre mice; The Jackson Laboratory), and R26:lacZbpA^floxDTA mice (R-DTA mice) (32 (link)). R-DTA mice and CD11c-Cre mice, which had been backcrossed for ten generations on to C57BL/6 mice, were cross-mated for generating CD11c-Cre:R-DTA mice used as ΔCD11c^hi cDC mice, and their WT littermates were used as CD11c^hi cDC-sufficient control mice. B6.CD45.1⁺OT-I TCR Tg mice harboring OVA-specific CD8⁺ T cells (B6.CD45.1⁺OT-I mice) and B6.CD45.1⁺OT-II TCR Tg mice harboring OVA-specific CD4⁺ T cells (B6.CD45.1⁺OT-II mice) were generated as described previously (4 (link), 33 (link)–36 (link)). All mice were bred and maintained in specific pathogen-free conditions in the animal facility at the University of Miyazaki. All experiments were performed in accordance with institutional guidelines and approved by the Animal Experiment Committee and Gene Recombination Experiment Committee at the University of Miyazaki.