A Highly Sensitive Flow Cytometric Approach to Detect Rare Antigen-Specific T Cells: Development and Comparison to Standard Monitoring Tools.

ABSTRACT: Personalized vaccines against patient-unique tumor-associated antigens represent a promising new approach for cancer immunotherapy. Vaccine efficacy is assessed by quantification of changes in the frequency and/or the activity of antigen-specific T cells. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent spot (ELISpot) and flow cytometry (FCM) are methodologies frequently used for assessing vaccine efficacy. We tested these methodologies and found that both ELISpot and standard FCM [monitoring CD3/CD4/CD8/IFNγ/Viability+CD14+CD19 (dump)] demonstrate background IFNγ secretion, which, in many cases, was higher than the antigen-specific signal measured by the respective methodology (frequently ranging around 0.05-0.2%). To detect such weak T-cell responses, we developed an FCM panel that included two early activat

SUBMITTER: Dror Levinsky M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9913544 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature