Quantitative and qualitative iNKT repertoire associations with disease susceptibility and outcome in macaque tuberculosis infection

Correlates of immune protection that reliably predict vaccine efficacy against Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) infection are urgently needed. Invariant NKT cells (iNKTs) are CD1d-dependent innate T cells that augment host antimicrobial immunity through production of cytokines, including interferon (IFN)- γ and tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-α. We determined peripheral blood iNKT numbers, their proliferative responses and iNKT subset proportions after in vitro antigen expansion by α-galactosylceramide (αGC) in a large cohort of mycobacteria-naïve non-human primates, and macaques from Bacillus Calm ette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine and Mtb challenge studies.

Source: Tuberculosis - April 28, 2017 Category: Respiratory Medicine Authors: Andrew Chancellor, Andrew White, Anna S. Tocheva, Joe R. Fenn, Mike Dennis, Liku Tezera, Akul Singhania, Tim Elliott, Marc Tebruegge, Paul Elkington, Stephan Gadola, Sally Sharpe, Salah Mansour Source Type: research