Project description:Temporal analysis of T-cell receptor (TCR) repertoire has been used to monitor treatment-induced changes in antigen-specific T cells in patients with cancer. However, lack of experimental model that allows the temporal analysis of TCR repertoire in same individual in homogeneous population limit the understanding of causal relationship between changes in TCR repertoire and antitumor responses. A bilateral tumor model, in which tumor cells were inoculated into the bilateral backs of mice, can be used for temporal analysis in TCR repertoire. In this study, we examined the prerequisite for this strategy: TCR repertoire are conserved between the bilateral tumor with same growth rate. The bilateral tumors with equivalent tumor size and draining lymph nodes (dLN) were collected 13 days after the tumor inoculation to analyze the TCR repertoire of CD4+ and CD8+ T cells. Most of the tumor-infiltrating T-cell clones were highly conserved between the bilateral tumors, and the extent of clonal expansion was equivalent. In addition, the similarity between bilateral tumors were equivalent to the heterogeneity in one side of the tumor. The similarity of TCR repertoire in the bilateral dLN was markedly lower than that of the tumor, suggesting that tumor-reactive T-cell clones induced independently in each dLN were integrated during recirculation and then infiltrated the tumor. These findings suggest that our bilateral tumor model is suitable for temporal monitoring of TCR repertoire to evaluate temporal and treatment-induced changes in tumor-reactive T-cell clones.
Project description:To track for T cell clones from donor memory T cell fraction infused after abT/CD19-depleted allogenic HSCT we performed TCR beta repertoire sequencing. Patient peripheral blood repertoire was sequenced in two timepoints (p3 and p4: d120-180 and d360-500). Reperotoires for bulk and CD4+ or CD8+ cells from CD45RA-depleted donor apheresis were obtained for most donor-recipient pairs. TCR beta cDNA libraries were prepared using previously published protocol (Zvyagin I.V. et al., Leukemia, 2017). Libraries were sequenced on Illumina NextSeq 500/550 and HiSeq2000/2500 in pair-end mode with read length 100-150 bp. MiGEC software were used for demultiplexing and unique molecular identifier sequence extraction software (https://github.com/mikessh/migec).
Project description:Fibrosis is the final path of nearly every form of chronic disease and accounts for up to 45% of all deaths in the developed world. However, antifibrotic therapies that target fibrogenic cells are lacking. We tested whether specific immunization against ADAM12 can elicit an antigen-specific cytotoxic T cell response to ameliorate liver fibrosis. In this study, we performed T cell receptor (TCR) alpha- and beta-chain repertoire sequencing on fibrotic livers to further characterize the T cell response and to detect potential TCR clonotypes. We observed TCR clonality of liver-infiltrating T cells from v-A12- and control-vaccinated mice with minimal overlap to v-CTRL mice in two α-chain sequences. However, the vast majority of expanded clones from v-A12-vaccinated animals showed a unique sequence pattern. Moreover, there was no overlap in the β-chain sequences between v-A12-vaccinated and control mice, suggesting a vaccination-induced expansion of antigen-specific TCR clonotypes.
Project description:Purpose: Despite the well-established association between T cell-mediated inflammation and non-ischemic heart failure (HF), the specific mechanisms triggering T cell activation during the progression of HF and the antigens involved are poorly understood. We hypothesized that clonal expansion of CD4+ T cell in response to cardiac neoantigens promote the progression of HF. Methods: We used transverse aortic constriction (TAC) in mice to trigger HF and profiled the TCR repertoire by mRNA sequencing of CD4+ T cells from 3 pooled Nur77GFP reporter mice, which transiently express GFP upon TCR engagement. We performed TCR clonal analysis of 5000 TCR-activated GFP+CD4+ T cells sorted from the LV, and 5000 CD4+ T cells sorted from the thymus, the inguinal lymph nodes (iLNs) and the heart-draining mediastinal lymph nodes (mLNs) by bulk RNA sequencing of the TCR beta chain after 8wks of TAC surgery. Paired‐end 300 base pair reads were obtained by Illumina sequencing and aligned and assembled using MiXCR software. Results: As expected, the greatest number of unique TCR beta clonotypes (4412 clones) – and therefore the highest TCR diversity – was identified in the thymus. The heart draining mLNs showed a much lower degree of TCR clonal diversity relative to the peripheral iLNs, suggesting that cardiac antigen-driven clonal expansion occurs at the mLNs that directly drain the heart. TCR-activated GFP+CD4+ T cells in the LV represented even lower TCR diversity relative to other sites. Conclusion: Collectively, our study demonstrates that in response to cardiac pressure overload, CD4+ T cells clonally expand in the heart-draining mLN; whilst a limited repertoire of CD4+ T cell clones engage endogenous antigens in the heart.
Project description:<p>Diversity and size of the antigen-specific T cell receptor (TCR) repertoire are two critical determinants for successful control of chronic infection. Varicella zoster virus (VZV) that establishes latency during childhood is able to escape control mechanisms, in particular with increasing age. We examined the TCR diversity of VZV-specific CD4 T cells in individuals older than 50 years by studying three identical twin pairs and three unrelated individuals before and after vaccination with live attenuated VZV. While all individuals had a small number of dominant T cell clones, the breadth of the VZV-specific repertoire differed markedly among different individuals. A genetic influence was seen for the sharing of individual TCR sequences from antigen-specific cells, but not for repertoire richness or the selection of clonal dominance. VZV vaccination favored the expansion of infrequent VZV-specific TCRs including those from naïve T cells while leaving dominant T cell clones mostly unaffected.</p>