{"doi":"10.1126/sciadv.adg8126","title":"Expression of the transcription factor Klf6 by thymic epithelial cells is required for thymus development","abstract":"Thymic epithelial cells (TEC) control T cell development and play essential roles in establishing self-tolerance. By using Foxn1-Cre –driven ablation of Klf6 gene in TEC, we identified Klf6 as a critical factor in TEC development. Klf6 deficiency resulted in a hypoplastic thymus—evident from fetal stages into adulthood—in which a dramatic increase in the frequency of apoptotic TEC was observed. Among cortical TEC (cTEC), a previously unreported cTEC population expressing the transcription factor Sox10 was relatively expanded. Within medullary TEC (mTEC), mTEC I and Tuft-like mTEC IV were disproportionately decreased. Klf6 deficiency altered chromatin accessibility and affected TEC chromatin configuration. Consistent with these defects, naïve conventional T cells and invariant natural killer T cells were reduced in the spleen. Late stages of T cell receptor–dependent selection of thymocytes were affected, and mice exhibited autoimmunity. Thus, Klf6 has a prosurvival role and affects the development of specific TEC subsets contributing to thymic function.","journal":"Science Advances","year":2023,"id":350423,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":10,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9528,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2023-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":771376,"name":"Gustavo Ulises Martinez‐Ruíz","orcid":"0000-0002-3555-659X","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":471419,"name":"Yongge Zhao","orcid":"0000-0003-4466-2391","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":513297,"name":"Susannah C. Shissler","orcid":"0000-0002-0660-9955","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":813726,"name":"Jennifer E. Cowan","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":366403,"name":"Yi Ding","orcid":"0000-0002-1958-8524","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":771992,"name":"Abigail Morales‐Sánchez","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":714504,"name":"Masaki Ishikawa","orcid":"0000-0003-3276-9474","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":851647,"name":"Marieke Lavaert","orcid":"0000-0002-5814-7940","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":737452,"name":"Arundhoti Das","orcid":"0000-0001-8574-9368","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":497095,"name":"Donna Butcher","orcid":"0000-0002-2065-8067","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":299179,"name":"Andrew Warner","orcid":"0000-0001-6023-1423","position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1094818,"name":"Melissa Kallarakal","orcid":null,"position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1094819,"name":"Jingqiu Chen","orcid":null,"position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":896162,"name":"Noémi Kedei","orcid":"0000-0002-6625-6119","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":226280,"name":"Michael C. Kelly","orcid":"0000-0003-0654-2778","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":769618,"name":"Lauren Brinster","orcid":null,"position":16,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":230388,"name":"David Allman","orcid":"0000-0001-9345-1502","position":17,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":471420,"name":"Avinash Bhandoola","orcid":"0000-0002-4657-8372","position":18,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":741131,"name":"Justin Malin","orcid":"0009-0004-0842-1747","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":61,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:12:23.769679Z","pmid":"37967174","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}