# Differential Regulation and Function of Skin Innate Lymphoid Cells in Homeostasis and Inflammation

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS HLTH SCIENCE CENTER · 2021 · $325,435

## Abstract

Summary
Skin is under frequent assaults from environmental agents. Various immune cells reside
in the skin to protect against the assaults. Innate lymphoid cells (ILCs) are a family of
recently identified innate lymphocytes that are preferentially enriched in barrier tissues
such as the skin for local protection but they could be also involved in promoting the skin
inflammatory diseases if dysregulated. Understanding how skin-specific localization and
function of the innate lymphoid cells are regulated is critical in helping to design the
strategy targeting specific innate lymphocyte populations for therapeutic purposes. Our
previous study has found that the majority of ILCs in the healthy skin expressed a skin-
specific chemokine receptor CCR10. In addition, we found that the skin-specific CCR10+
ILCs were generated in skin-draining lymph nodes (sLNs) under homeostatic conditions
with help of skin-associated CD207+ dendritic cells (DCs) and depended on CCR10 for
their localization in the skin, where they regulate regulatory and effector T cells to
promote skin immune homeostasis. Under immune dysregulatory or inflammatory
conditions, generation of CCR10+ ILCs was reduced while there was increased
differentiation of CCR10+ ILCs into CCR10- ILCs in the skin, suggesting that CCR10+
and CCR10- ILCs are differentially involved in the skin homeostasis and inflammation. In
this application, we will determine cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying
generation and function of skin-specific ILCs in homeostasis and inflammation.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10151535
- **Project number:** 5R01AR070887-05
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS HLTH SCIENCE CENTER
- **Principal Investigator:** Na Xiong
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $325,435
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-08-01 → 2023-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10151535

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10151535, Differential Regulation and Function of Skin Innate Lymphoid Cells in Homeostasis and Inflammation (5R01AR070887-05). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10151535. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*