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Updated: Apr 5, 2026

Assessing the Innate Sensing of HIV-1 Infected CD4+ T Cells by Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cells Using an Ex vivo Co-culture System.
Published on: September 1, 2015
Spatiotemporally Distinct Interactions with Dendritic Cell Subsets Facilitates CD4+ and CD8+ T Cell Activation to
Jyh Liang Hor1, Paul G Whitney2, Ali Zaid1
1Department of Microbiology and Immunology, The University of Melbourne, at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, Parkville, VIC 3010, Australia; The Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Advanced Molecular Imaging, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC 3010, Australia.
Abstract:
The dynamics of when and where CD4(+) T cells provide help for CD8(+) T cell priming and which dendritic cells (DCs) activate CD4(+) T cells in vivo after localized infection are poorly understood. By using a cutaneous herpes simplex virus infection model combined with intravital 2-photon imaging of the draining lymph node (LN) to concurrently visualize pathogen-specific CD4(+) and CD8(+) T cells, we found that early priming of CD4(+) T cells involved clustering with migratory skin DCs. CD8(+) T cells did not interact with migratory DCs and their activation was delayed, requiring later clustering interactions with LN-resident XCR1(+) DCs. CD4(+) T cells interacted with these late CD8(+) T cell clusters on resident XCR1(+) DCs. Together, these data reveal asynchronous T cell activation by distinct DC subsets and highlight the key role of XCR1(+) DCs as the central platform for cytotoxic T lymphocyte activation and the delivery of CD4(+) T cell help.
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