The immune synapses reveal aberrant functions of CD8 T cells during chronic HIV infection [article]

Nadia Anikeeva, Maria Steblyanko, Leticia Kuri-Cervantes, Marcus Buggert, Michael R Betts, Yuri Sykulev
2022 bioRxiv   pre-print
It is well-established that chronic HIV infection causes persistent low-grade inflammation that induces premature aging of the immune system in HIV patient including senescence of memory and effector CD8 T cells. To uncover the reasons of gradually diminished potency of CD8 T cells from chronically HIV infected people, we have analyzed cellular morphology and dynamics of the synaptic interface followed exposure of peripheral polyclonal CD8 T cells at various differentiation stages to planar
more » ... d bilayers. The above parameters were linked to pattern of degranulation that determines efficiency of CD8 T cells cytolytic response. We found a large fraction of naive T cells from HIV infected people developing mature synapses and demonstrating focused degranulation, a signature of a differentiated T cells. Further differentiation of aberrant naive T cells leads to development of anomalous effector T cells undermining their capacity to control HIV and other viruses that could be contained otherwise.
doi:10.1101/2022.01.13.476200 fatcat:f57mtdwfsvfuzhiihuqww7mpbi