Dataset Information

Sepsis induces long-lasting impairments in CD4+ T-cell responses despite rapid numerical recovery of T-lymphocyte populations.

ABSTRACT: Massive apoptosis of lymphocytes is a hallmark of sepsis. The resulting immunosuppression is associated with secondary infections, which are often lethal. Moreover, sepsis-survivors are burdened with increased morbidity and mortality for several years after the sepsis episode. The duration and clinical consequences of sepsis induced-immunosuppression are currently unknown. We have used the mouse model of peritoneal contamination and infection (PCI) to investigate the quantitative and qualitative recovery of T lymphocytes for 3.5 months after sepsis with or without IL-7 treatment. Thymic output and the numbers of naive and effector/memory CD4+ and CD8+ lymphocytes quickly recovered after sepsis. IL-7 treatment resulted in an accelerated recovery of CD8+ lymphocytes. Next generation sequencing revealed no significant narrowing of the T cell receptor repertoire 3.5 months after sepsis. In contrast, detailed functional analyses of T helper (Th)-cell responses towards a fungal antigen revealed a significant loss of Th cells. Whereas cytokine production was not impaired at the single cell level, the absolute number of Th cells specific for the fungal antigen was reduced. Our data indicate a clinically relevant loss of pathogen-specific T cell clones after sepsis. Given the small number of naive T lymphocytes specific for a given antigen, this decrement of T cell clones remains undetected even by sensitive methods such as deep sequencing. Taken together, our data are compatible with long lasting impairments in CD4+ T-cell responses after sepsis despite rapid recovery of T lymphocyte populations.

SUBMITTER: Ammer-Herrmenau C

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6366777 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Similar Datasets

Project description:Our experiments examined T-lymphocyte numbers and effector-functions in peritoneal contamination and infection (PCI) a mouse model of sepsis. One of our main questions was how T-lymphocytes reconstitute after sepsis-induced lymphopenia. We investigated the quantitative and qualitative recovery of T lymphocytes for 3.5 months after sepsis with or without IL-7 treatment. Sepsis is an immunological dysfunction against pathogens leading to inflammation with massive cytokine production. Simultaneously immunosuppression occurs e.g. lymphopenia, which is a hallmark of sepsis. The resulting immunosuppression is associated with secondary infections, which are often lethal. Moreover sepsis-survivors are burdened with increased morbidity and mortality for several years after the sepsis episode. The duration and clinical consequences of sepsis induced-immunosuppression are currently unknown. More than 50% of T-cells undergo apoptosis shortly after sepsis-induction. However, 8 days after sepsis onset, surviving mice present normal lymphocyte counts. Theoretically, T-cells could reconstitute in two different ways. Firstly, the diminished pool of T-cells is replenished by newly in thymus produced T-cells with new diverse T-cell-receptors (TCRs). Alternatively, remaining T-cells start to proliferate until reaching normal cell count. If this was the case all divided cells shared the same TCRs as primary cells. This could lead to a narrowed TCR diversity within a quantitative normalized T-cell pool and would be an explanation for the long-lasting immune incompetence. To address the question how T-cells recover from lymphopenia we applied next generation sequencing (NGS) to analyse TCR diversity in septic and healthy mice. One group of septic mice received Interleukin-7 (IL-7), an interleukin which regulates T-cell homeostasis and is a promising therapeutically approach for septic patients. 50000 sequences per mouse were analyzed and the three different groups (controls, sepsis, sepsis + IL-7 treatment) compared regarding their diversity. The sequenced raw data (fastq) are uploaded in this library.

Project description:The presence of pre-existing malignancy in murine hosts results in increased immune dysregulation and risk of mortality following a septic insult. Based on the known systemic immunologic changes that occur in cancer hosts, we hypothesized that the presence of pre-existing malignancy would result in phenotypic and functional changes in CD4+ T cell responses following sepsis. In order to conduct a non-biased, unsupervised analysis of phenotypic differences between CD4+ T cell compartments, cohorts of mice were injected with LLC1 tumor cells and tumors were allowed to grow for 3 weeks. These cancer hosts and age-matched non-cancer controls were then subjected to CLP. Splenocytes were harvested at 24h post CLP and flow cytometry and SPADE (Spanning-tree Progression Analysis of Density-normalized Events) were used to analyze populations of CD4+ cells most different between the two groups. Results indicated that relative to non-cancer controls, cancer mice contained more resting memory CD4+ T cells, more activated CD4+ effectors, and fewer naïve CD4+ T cells during sepsis, suggesting that the CD4+ T cell compartment in cancer septic hosts is one of increased activation and differentiation. Moreover, cancer septic animals exhibited expansion of two distinct subsets of CD4+ T cells relative to previously healthy septic controls. Specifically, we identified increases in both a PD-1hi population and a distinct 2B4hi BTLAhi LAG-3hi population in cancer septic animals. By combining phenotypic analysis of exhaustion markers with functional analysis of cytokine production, we found that PD-1+ CD4+ cells in cancer hosts failed to make any cytokines following CLP, while the 2B4+ PD-1lo cells in cancer mice secreted increased TNF during sepsis. In sum, the immunophenotypic landscape of cancer septic animals is characterized by both increased CD4+ T cell activation and exhaustion, findings that may underlie the observed increased mortality in mice with pre-existing malignancy following sepsis.

Dataset Information

Sepsis induces long-lasting impairments in CD4+ T-cell responses despite rapid numerical recovery of T-lymphocyte populations.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets