Dendritic cells (DCs) are professional antigen-presenting cells of the immune system and can be generated in vitro from bone-marrow cells. In this study, we systematically investigated by DNA array analysis the expression profiles of 514 immunologically relevant genes in two populations of mouse bone marrow-derived DC, immature (DCIMAT), and lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated mature (DCMAT) DCs. Our data showed that DCIMAT expressed transcripts for 69 (13.42% of the 514) of these genes and that, upon maturation, 32 (6.23%) of these were up-regulated and 40 (7.78%) down-regulated. Maturation-dependent upregulation, defined by a differential expression (DE) ratio of >2, was observed among five cytokine (Flt-3L, TNF-alpha, IL-1alpha and -1beta, and IL-6), three chemokine (RANTES, MIP-2 and GROa) and three other (iNOS, MMP-13, and STRAP) genes. Reciprocally, maturation-dependent down-regulation occurred with one cytokine (IGF-1), two chemokine receptor (CCR2 and CCR5), and three other (RP105, Ax1, and UCP2) genes. Lower level, but nevertheless significantly enhanced expression of the chemokine receptor CCR7 and of NF-kappaB was also observed upon DC maturation. This DC maturation profile confirms previous findings from other lab, but it also substantially broadens our view of these cells by documenting expression changes among genes (e.g., IGF-1, MMP-13, STRAP) not reported previously in these cells. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science.