title: Improvement of Herpesvirus saimiri T cell immortalization procedure to generate multiple CD4+ T-cell clones from peripheral blood lymphocytes of AIDS patients.
abstract: Herpesvirus saimiri (HVS) can infect and immortalize human T lymphocytes of both CD4- and CD8-positive phenotypes. We have previously shown that infection of peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) from AIDS patients with HVS predominantly yielded immortalized CD8-positive T cell clones. Here we show that CD4-positive T cells from AIDS patients can be efficiently immortalized by HVS if patient PBL are enriched for CD4-positive T cell subpopulation prior to HVS infection. Such cells can be cloned and maintained in culture for prolonged times, and they exhibit activated T cell phenotype of Th1 class and are susceptible to HIV-1 infection. Several immortalized T cell clones obtained from one out of three AIDS patients tested here were HIV-1 positive and produced infectious virus. This approach permits efficient generation of multiple CD4-positive T cell clones from AIDS patients for functional and virological studies.
authors.affiliation: Molecular Virology Laboratory, St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York 10019, USA.
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Saha
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: McKinley
authors.forename: D J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Volsky
mesh_terms: D000163:Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome / Q000276:immunology* / Q000821:virology*; D018791:CD4 Lymphocyte Count; D015496:CD4-Positive T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology / Q000821:virology*; D018929:Cell Culture Techniques / Q000379:methods; D002469:Cell Separation; D002472:Cell Transformation, Viral; D002999:Clone Cells; D006567:Herpesvirus 2, Saimiriine / Q000276:immunology*; D006801:Humans; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation