Status of activation of circulating vaccine-elicited CD8+ T cells.
Selective blunting of the status of activation of circulating tumor-specific T cells was invoked to explain their paradoxical coexistence with unhampered tumor growth. By analogy, lack of tumor regression in the face of observable melanoma vaccine-induced T cell responses might be attributed to their status of activation. We enumerated with HLA-A*0201/peptide tetramers (tHLA) vaccine-elicited T cell precursor frequency directly in PBMC of patients with melanoma undergoing vaccination with the HLA-A*0201-associated gp100:209-217(210 M) epitope (g209-2 M). Furthermore, we tested by intracellular (IC)-FACS analysis and quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) the ability of postvaccination PBMC to produce cytokine in response to challenge with vaccine-related epitopes or vaccine-matched (HLA-A*0201) melanoma cells. Vaccine-induced enhancement of T cell precursor frequency could be detected with tHLA in PBMC from six of eight patients studied at frequencies ranging between 0.3 and 2.3% of the total CD8+ population. Stimulation with vaccine-related epitopes induced IFN-gamma expression detectable by IC-FACS or qRT-PCR, respectively, in five and six of these patients. Furthermore, down-regulation of tHLA staining was noted upon cognate stimulation that could be utilized as an additional marker of T cell responsiveness. Finally, we observed in six patients an enhancement of reactivity against vaccine-matched tumor targets that was partly independent of documented vaccine-specific immune responses. A strong correlation was noted between tHLA staining of postvaccination PBMC and IFN-gamma expression by the same samples upon vaccine-relevant stimulation and assessed either by IC-FACS or qRT-PCR. Thus, blunting of the status of T cell activation on itself cannot easily explain the lack of clinical responses observed with vaccination.
Surgery Branch, Division of Clinical Sciences, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD 20892-1502, USA.
M B
MB
Nielsen
V
V
Monsurro
S A
SA
Migueles
E
E
Wang
A
A
Perez-Diez
K H
KH
Lee
U
U
Kammula
S A
SA
Rosenberg
F M
FM
Marincola
D017951:Antigen Presentation; D000951:Antigens, Neoplasm / Q000097:blood / Q000276:immunology; D018414:CD8-Positive T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology* / Q000378:metabolism; D019496:Cancer Vaccines / Q000097:blood* / Q000276:immunology*; D002454:Cell Differentiation / Q000276:immunology; D002461:Cell Line, Transformed; D002999:Clone Cells; D018984:Epitopes, T-Lymphocyte / Q000276:immunology; D006680:HLA Antigens / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D016130:Immunophenotyping; D017493:Leukocyte Common Antigens / Q000096:biosynthesis; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation / Q000276:immunology*; D008545:Melanoma / Q000097:blood / Q000276:immunology* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000556:secondary; D009363:Neoplasm Proteins / Q000097:blood / Q000276:immunology; D011485:Protein Binding / Q000276:immunology; D016176:T-Lymphocyte Subsets / Q000276:immunology* / Q000378:metabolism
D000951:Antigens, Neoplasm; D019496:Cancer Vaccines; D018984:Epitopes, T-Lymphocyte; D006680:HLA Antigens; D009363:Neoplasm Proteins; D017493:Leukocyte Common Antigens