Abstract: Objectives To investigate the relationship between the expression of transcription factors GATA3/T-bet and disease activity of SLE, and study the role of T cells in the pathogenesis of SLE.Methods The expression of transcription factors T-bet/GATA3 in the PBMC from patients with SLE was detected by semiquantitative PCR and fluorescent real-time quantitative PCR.Results Fluoresent real-time quantitative PCR showed GATA3 mRNA level (△Ctvalue) in patients with active SLE (8.92±1.29) was markedly lower than that in patients with inactive SLE (12.20±1.18) and healthy controls (11.80±0.80), and GATA3 mRNA expression in patients with active SLE was markedly higher than that in patients with inactive SLE and healthy controls (P<0.01).Semiquantitative PCR also showed that GATA3 mRNA level in active patients (0.15±0.15) was higher than that in inactive patients (0.04±0.05) and healthy controls (0.03±0.03)(P<0.05).No significant difference in GATA3 mRNA expression between inactive pa tients and healthy controls was found by these two methods (P>0.05).There was no significant difference in T-bet mRNA expression among patients with active SLE (real-time quantitative PCR: 10.52±0.82, semiquantitative PCR: 0.30±0.23), patients with inactive disease (real-time quantitative PCR: 9.93±1.13, se miquantitative PCR: 0.28±0.14) and healthy subjects (real-time quantitative PCR: 10.23±1.32, semiquantitative PCR: 0.22±0.11)(P>0.05).Conclusions The high expression of GATA3, a Th2 inducer, may correlate with the disease activity of SLE, while T-bet, a Th1 inducer, may not correlate with the disease activity.

Key words: Lupus erythematosus,systemic, GATA3, T-bet