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Updated: Jun 2, 2026

Isolation and Th17 Differentiation of Naïve CD4 T Lymphocytes
Published on: September 26, 2013
Age-associated alteration in naive and memory Th17 cell response in humans
Jin Soo Lee1, Won-Woo Lee, Sang Hyun Kim
1Department of Internal Medicine, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520, USA.
None:
Th17 cells produce IL-17 that plays an important role in host defense. However, little is known about whether aging affects human Th17 cells. Here we demonstrated that healthy elderly people (age ≥ 65) had a decreased frequency of IL-17-producing cells in memory CD4(+) T cells compared to healthy young people (age ≤ 40) while both groups had similar frequencies of IFN-γ-producing cells in the same memory cell subset as measured by flow cytometry. In contrast, the healthy elderly had increased differentiation of IL-17-producing effector cells but not IFN-γ-producing cells from naive CD4(+) T cells compared to the healthy young. The results of ELISA also showed similar findings with increased IL-17 production from naive CD4(+) T cells and decreased IL-17 production from memory CD4(+) T cells in the elderly compared to the young. These findings indicate that aging differentially affects naive and memory Th17 cell responses in humans.
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