Project description:Neonates are highly susceptible to intracellular pathogens, leading to high morbidity and mortality rates. CD8+ T lymphocytes are responsible for the elimination of infected cells. Understanding the response of these cells to normal and high stimulatory conditions is important to propose better treatments for neonates. We have previously shown that human neonatal CD8+ T cells overexpress innate inflammatory genes and have a low expression of cytotoxic and cell signaling genes. To investigate the activation potential of these cells, we evaluated the transcriptome of human neonatal and adult naïve CD8+ T cells after TCR/CD28 signals +/- IL-12. We found that in neonatal cells, IL-12 signals contribute to the adult-like expression of genes associated with cell-signaling, T-cell cytokines, metabolism and cell division. Additionally, IL-12 signals contributed to the downregulation of the neutrophil signature transcription factor CEBPE and other immaturity related genes. To validate the transcriptome results, we evaluated the expression of a series of genes by RT-qPCR and the promoter methylation status on independent samples. We found that, in agreement with the transcriptome, IL-12 signals induced both the chromatin closure of neutrophil-like genes and the opening of cytotoxicity genes, suggesting that IL-12 signals contribute to the epigenetic reprogramming of neonatal lymphocytes. Furthermore, a high expression of some inflammatory genes was observed in naive and stimulated neonatal cells, in agreement with the high inflammatory profile of neonates to infections. Altogether our results point to an important contribution of IL-12 signals to the reprogramming of the neonatal CD8+ T cells.
Project description:The expansion, trafficking and functional effectiveness of adoptively transferred CD8+ T-cells play a critical role in mediating effective anti-tumor immunity. However, the mechanisms which program the highly proliferative and functional state of CD8+ T-cells are not completely understood. We hypothesized that IL-12, a cytokine commonly induced by TLR activation, could enhance T-cell priming by altering responsiveness to antigen and cytokines. Priming of tumor specific CD8+ T-cells in the presence of IL-12 induced the acquisition of a 'polyfunctional' effector response and increased the generation of memory cells. Moreover, IL-12 priming also promoted high levels of the IL-2 receptor alpha-chain (CD25) and robust IL-2 mediated activation of STAT5. This sensitivity to IL-2 translated into enhanced in vivo proliferation of adoptively transferred CD8+ T-cells. Furthermore, real-time, in vivo imaging of T-cell trafficking confirmed the ability of IL-12 priming to drive in vivo proliferation. IL-12 priming enhanced the anti-tumor function of adoptively transferred cells by reducing established subcutaneous tumor burden, and significantly increasing survival in an established intracranial tumor model. Finally, IL-12 priming of human PBMCs generates tumor specific T-cells phenotypically and functionally similar to IL-12 primed Pmel-1 T-cells. These results highlight IL-12 as an important mediator of CD8+ T-cell effector function and anti-tumor immunity. We primed Pmel-1 TCR transgenic CD8+ T-cells with cognate antigen and either IL-2 or IL-12 and compared their gene expression profiles. This was used to identify pathways or genes necessary for anti-tumor activity in vivo. RNA was isolated from Pmel-1 T-cells primed with antigen and cytokine for 6 days and hybridized to Affymetrix arrays.
Project description:Transcriptional profiling and gene expression profiling analysis of sorted CD8+IL-10+ T cells compared to CD8+IL-10- T cells using IL-10-GFP(tiger) reporter mice Two sample, CD8+IL-10+ T cells vs CD8+IL-10- T cells. Three replicate per array.
Project description:Engineered cytokine-based approaches for immunotherapy of cancer are poised to enter the clinic, with IL-12 being at the forefront. However, little is known about potential mechanisms of resistance to cytokine therapies. We found that orthotopic murine lung tumors were resistant to systemically delivered IL-12 fused to murine serum albumin (MSA, IL12-MSA) due to low IL-12R expression on tumor-reactive CD8+ T cells. IL2-MSA increased binding of IL12-MSA by tumor-reactive CD8+ T cells, and combined administration of IL12-MSA and IL2-MSA led to enhanced tumor-reactive CD8+ T cell effector differentiation, decreased numbers of tumor-infiltrating CD4+ regulatory T (Treg) cells, and increased survival of lung tumor-bearing mice. Predictably, the combination of IL-2 and IL-12 at therapeutic doses led to significant dose-limiting toxicity. Administering IL-12 and IL-2 analogs with preferential binding to cells expressing IL12rb1 and CD25, respectively, led to a significant extension of survival in mice with lung tumors while abrogating dose-limiting toxicity. These findings suggest that IL-12 and IL-2 represent a rational approach to combination cytokine therapy whose dose-limiting toxicity can be overcome with engineered cytokine variants.
Project description:The expansion, trafficking and functional effectiveness of adoptively transferred CD8+ T-cells play a critical role in mediating effective anti-tumor immunity. However, the mechanisms which program the highly proliferative and functional state of CD8+ T-cells are not completely understood. We hypothesized that IL-12, a cytokine commonly induced by TLR activation, could enhance T-cell priming by altering responsiveness to antigen and cytokines. Priming of tumor specific CD8+ T-cells in the presence of IL-12 induced the acquisition of a 'polyfunctional' effector response and increased the generation of memory cells. Moreover, IL-12 priming also promoted high levels of the IL-2 receptor alpha-chain (CD25) and robust IL-2 mediated activation of STAT5. This sensitivity to IL-2 translated into enhanced in vivo proliferation of adoptively transferred CD8+ T-cells. Furthermore, real-time, in vivo imaging of T-cell trafficking confirmed the ability of IL-12 priming to drive in vivo proliferation. IL-12 priming enhanced the anti-tumor function of adoptively transferred cells by reducing established subcutaneous tumor burden, and significantly increasing survival in an established intracranial tumor model. Finally, IL-12 priming of human PBMCs generates tumor specific T-cells phenotypically and functionally similar to IL-12 primed Pmel-1 T-cells. These results highlight IL-12 as an important mediator of CD8+ T-cell effector function and anti-tumor immunity.
Project description:IL-10 is an anti-inflammatory cytokine that has been shown to be produced by antigen-specific CD8 T cells at the peak of viral encephalitis. We found that IL-10+CD8 T cells are more activated and cytolytic than IL-10-CD8 T cells. We used microarrays to detect gene expression changes in directly ex vivo sorted CNS IL-10+ and IL-10- CD8 T cells from a neurotropic J2.2-V-1-infected mouse. C57Bl/6 Vert-X (IL-10-eGFP) mice were infected intracranially with 500 PFU J2.2-V-1 virus and seven days later their brain lymphocytes from three mice were pooled and then isolated and negatively selected for CD8 T cells. The CD8 pooled brain lymphocytes were then sorted for IL-10+ and IL-10- CD8 T lymphocytes using GFP as a marker from the same samples. This was performed three times to obtain six samples total. RNA was extracted and hybridized to GeneChip Mouse GENE 1.0 ST arrays (Affymetrix).
Project description:We found a unique subset of effector memory (EM) CD8+ T cells that expressed high levels of IL-6 receptor in human peripheral blood. These cells which also expressed high levels of IL-7Ra (referred to as IL-6R high IL-7Rahigh cells) had the a distinct gene expression profile and cellular characteristics compared to other EM CD8+ T cells. IL-6R high IL-7Ra high cells were early differentiated EM CD8+ T cells with decreased expression of T-bet, KLRG1, perforin and granzyme B. These cells had increased cell proliferation likely secondary to enhanced IL-2 production and high affinity IL-2R expression. IL-6R high IL-7Ra high EM CD8+ T cells exclusively produced high levels of IL-2, IL-5, IL-9 and IL-13 although IFN-r was produced by this cell subset and other EM CD8+ T cells. Of interest, IL-6R high IL-7Ra high EM CD8+ T cells expanded in the peripheral blood of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma where CD8+ T cells, IL-13 and IFN-r are suggested to be involved in the pathogenesis. Being the early-differentiated EM CD8+ T cells with a potent capacity to proliferate, survive and generate multiple cytokines, IL-6R high IL-7Ra high EM CD8+ T cells may serve as a primary reservoir for effector CD8+ T cells which potently expand and produce cytokines upon immune stimulation. Duplicate experiments were performed for each condition. In each condition, we independently prepared total RNA using the RNeasy mini kit (Qiagen) and assessed RNA integrity using Bioanalyzer 2100 (Agilent)- RINs were close to 10 for all samples. RNA was then amplified and hybridized to the Illumina HumanHT-12 v4.0 BeadChip, according to Illumina standard protocols.
Project description:Transcriptional profiling and gene expression profiling analysis of sorted CD8+IL-10+ T cells compared to CD8+IL-10- T cells using IL-10-GFP(tiger) reporter mice
Project description:Chronic viral infections represent a major public health problem. Although it is well understood that neonates and adults respond differently to chronic viral infections (HIV, HCV), the underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood. In this study, we transferred neonatal and adult CD8+ T cells into a mouse model of chronic infection (LCMV clone 13) and dissected out the key cell-intrinsic differences that alter their ability to protect the host. Interestingly, we found that neonatal CD8+ T cells preferentially become effector cells early in chronic infection when compared to adult CD8+ T cells, and resist commitment to the exhausted differentiation trajectory. Further, neonatal CD8+ T cells are preferentially maintained as stem-like exhausted progenitors rather than terminally exhausted cells during the chronic phase of infection. The altered differentiation trajectories of neonatal and adult CD8+ T cells is functionally significant, for the neonatal cells protect from viral replication. Together, our work demonstrates how cell-intrinsic differences between neonatal and adult CD8+ T cells influences key cell fate decisions during chronic infection.