Immunophenotypic characterization of CSF B cells in virus-associated neuroinflammatory diseases

Intrathecal antibody synthesis is a well-documented phenomenon in infectious neurological diseases as well as in demyelinating diseases, but little is known about the role of B cells in the central nervous systems. We examined B cell and T cell immunophenotypes in CSF of patients with HTLV-1-associated myelopathy/tropical spastic paraparesis (HAM/TSP) compared to healthy normal donors and subjects with the other chronic virus infection and/or neuroinflammatory diseases including HIV infection, multiple sclerosis (MS) and progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy. Antibody secreting B cells (ASCs) were elevated in HAM/TSP patients, which was significantly correlated with intrathecal HTLV-1-specific antibody responses. High frequency of ASCs was also detected in patients with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS). While RRMS patients showed significant correlations between ASCs and memory follicular helper CD4+ T cells, CD4+CD25+ T cells were elevated in HAM/TSP patients, which were significantly correlated with ASCs and HTLV-1 proviral load. These results highlight the importance of the B cell compartment and the associated inflammatory milieu in HAM/TSP patients where virus-specific antibody production may be required to control viral persistence and/or may be associated with disease development.