IL-7 promotes the transition of CD4 effectors to persistent memory cells.
After transfer to adoptive hosts, in vitro-generated CD4 effectors can become long-lived memory cells, but the factors regulating this transition are unknown. We find that low doses of interleukin (IL) 7 enhance survival of effectors in vitro without driving their division. When in vitro-generated effectors are transferred to normal intact adoptive hosts, they survive and rapidly become small resting cells with a memory phenotype. CD4 effectors generated from wild-type versus IL-7 receptor-/- mice were transferred to adoptive hosts, including intact mice and those deficient in IL-7. In each case, the response to IL-7 was critical for good recovery of donor cells after 5-7 d. Recovery was also IL-7-dependent in Class II hosts where division was minimal. Blocking antibodies to IL-7 dramatically decreased short-term recovery of transferred effectors in vivo without affecting their division. These data indicate that IL-7 plays a critical role in promoting memory CD4 T cell generation by providing survival signals, which allow effectors to successfully become resting memory cells.
Li
JiChu
J
Trudeau Institute, Inc, Saranac Lake, NY 12983, USA.
Huston
Gail
G
Swain
Susan L
SL
D019264:Adoptive Transfer; D000818:Animals; D017209:Apoptosis; D015496:CD4-Positive T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology / Q000502:physiology*; D002470:Cell Survival; D007156:Immunologic Memory; D015851:Interleukin-7 / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D011948:Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell / Q000502:physiology; D020395:Receptors, Interleukin-7 / Q000032:analysis / Q000502:physiology
D015851:Interleukin-7; D011948:Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell; D020395:Receptors, Interleukin-7