Cytotoxic CD8(+) T lymphocytes directly kill infected or aberrant cells and secrete proinflammatory cytokines.
By using metal-labeled probes and mass spectrometric analysis (cytometry by time-of-flight, or CyTOF) of human CD8(+) T cells, we analyzed the expression of many more proteins than previously possible with fluorescent labels, including surface markers, cytokines, and antigen specificity with modified peptide-MHC tetramers.
With 3-dimensional principal component analysis (3D-PCA) to display phenotypic diversity, we observed a relatively uniform pattern of variation in all subjects tested, highlighting the interrelatedness of previously described subsets and the continuous nature of CD8(+) T cell differentiation.
These data also showed much greater complexity in the CD8(+) T cell compartment than previously appreciated, including a nearly combinatorial pattern of cytokine expression, with distinct niches occupied by virus-specific cells.
This large degree of functional diversity even between cells with the same specificity gives CD8(+) T cells a remarkable degree of flexibility in responding to pathogens.
2012-03-05
Eng.
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University, CA 94305, USA.
Immunity. 2012 Jan;36(1):142-52
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