Zeb1 represses TCR signaling, promotes the proliferation of T cell progenitors and is essential for NK1.1⁺ T cell development

T cell development proceeds under the influence of a network of transcription factors (TFs). The precise role of Zeb1, a member of this network, remains unclear. Here, we report that Zeb1 expression is induced early during T cell development in CD4⁻CD8⁻ double-negative (DN) stage 2 (DN2). Zeb1 expression was further increased in the CD4⁺CD8⁺ double-positive (DP) stage before decreasing in more mature T cell subsets. We performed an exhaustive characterization of T cells in Cellophane mice that bear Zeb1 hypomorphic mutations. The Zeb1 mutation profoundly affected all thymic subsets, especially DN2 and DP cells. Zeb1 promoted the survival and proliferation of both cell populations in a cell-intrinsic manner. In the periphery of Cellophane mice, the number of conventional T cells was near normal, but invariant NKT cells, NK1.1⁺ γδ T cells and Ly49⁺ CD8 T cells were virtually absent. This suggested that Zeb1 regulates the development of unconventional T cell types from DP progenitors. A transcriptomic analysis of WT and Cellophane DP cells revealed that Zeb1 regulated the expression of multiple genes involved in the cell cycle and TCR signaling, which possibly occurred in cooperation with Tcf1 and Heb. Indeed, Cellophane DP cells displayed stronger signaling than WT DP cells upon TCR engagement in terms of the calcium response, phosphorylation events, and expression of early genes. Thus, Zeb1 is a key regulator of the cell cycle and TCR signaling during thymic T cell development. We propose that thymocyte selection is perturbed in Zeb1-mutated mice in a way that does not allow the survival of unconventional T cell subsets.