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New Tools to Expand Regulatory T Cells from HIV-1-infected Individuals
Published on: May 30, 2013
Regulatory T-Cell Activity But Not Conventional HIV-Specific T-Cell Responses Are Associated With Protection From
Laura Pattacini1, Jared M Baeten, Katherine K Thomas
1*Vaccine and Infectious Disease Division, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA; Departments of †Global Health; ‡Epidemiology; §Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA; ‖Statistical Center for HIV-1/AIDS Research and Prevention, Vaccine and Infectious Disease Division, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA; ¶Centre for Microbiology Research, Kenya Medical Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya; #Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA; **Department of Medical Microbiology, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada; ††Centre for Clinical Research, Kenya Medical Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya; and ‡‡Department of Pediatrics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA.
Objective:
Two distinct hypotheses have been proposed for T-cell involvement in protection from HIV-1 acquisition. First, HIV-1-specific memory T-cell responses generated on HIV-1 exposure could mount an efficient response to HIV-1 and inhibit the establishment of an infection. Second, a lower level of immune activation could reduce the numbers of activated, HIV-1-susceptible CD4 T cells, thereby diminishing the likelihood of infection.
Methods:
To test these hypotheses, we conducted a prospective study among high-risk heterosexual men and women, and tested peripheral blood samples from individuals who subsequently acquired HIV-1 during follow-up (cases) and from a subset of those who remained HIV-1 uninfected (controls).
Results:
We found no difference in HIV-1-specific immune responses between cases and controls, but Treg frequency was higher in controls as compared with cases and was negatively associated with frequency of effector memory CD4 T cells.
Conclusions:
Our findings support the hypothesis that low immune activation assists in protection from HIV-1 infection.
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