{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,29]],"date-time":"2026-04-29T10:16:14Z","timestamp":1777457774230,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":45,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2022,3,17]],"date-time":"2022-03-17T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1647475200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001691","name":"Japan Society for the Promotion of Science","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001691","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Immunol."],"abstract":"<jats:p>T-cell development in the thymus is dependent on Notch signaling induced by the interaction of Notch1, present on immigrant cells, with a Notch ligand, delta-like (Dll) 4, on the thymic epithelial cells. Phylogenetic analysis characterizing the properties of the Dll4 molecule suggests that Dll4 emerged from the common ancestor of lobe- and ray-finned fishes and diverged into bony fishes and terrestrial organisms, including mammals. The thymus evolved in cartilaginous fishes before Dll4, suggesting that T-cell development in cartilaginous fishes is dependent on Dll1 instead of Dll4. In this study, we compared the function of both Dll molecules in the thymic epithelium using <jats:italic>Foxn1-cre<\/jats:italic> and <jats:italic>Dll4<\/jats:italic>-floxed mice with conditional transgenic alleles in which the <jats:italic>Dll1<\/jats:italic> or <jats:italic>Dll4<\/jats:italic> gene is transcribed after the cre-mediated excision of the stop codon. The expression of Dll1 in the thymic epithelium completely restored the defect in the <jats:italic>Dll4<\/jats:italic>-deficient condition, suggesting that Dll1 can trigger Notch signaling that is indispensable for T-cell development in the thymus. Moreover, using bone marrow chimeras with <jats:italic>Notch1<\/jats:italic>- or <jats:italic>Notch2<\/jats:italic>-deficient hematopoietic cells, we showed that Dll1 is able to activate Notch signaling, which is sufficient to induce T-cell development, with both the receptors, in contrast to Dll4, which works only with Notch1, in the thymic environment. These results strongly support the hypothesis that Dll1 regulates T-cell development <jats:italic>via<\/jats:italic> Notch1 and\/or Notch2 in the thymus of cartilaginous fishes and that Dll4 has replaced Dll1 in inducing thymic Notch signaling <jats:italic>via<\/jats:italic> Notch1 during evolution.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3389\/fimmu.2022.852427","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2022,3,17]],"date-time":"2022-03-17T08:36:36Z","timestamp":1647506196000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":8,"title":["Dll1 Can Function as a Ligand of Notch1 and Notch2 in the Thymic 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