[Role of CD4-CD8- T cells in the murine hepatitis virus type 3 induced chronic viral hepatitis].
OBJECTIVE
To investigate role of CD4-CD8- T cells in murine hepatitis virus type 3 (MHV-3) induced chronic viral hepatitis in C3H/Hej mice and to identify their surface markers.


METHODS
Thirty C3H/Hej mice received 10 Pfu MHV-3 intraperitoneally, the CD4-CD8- T cells were isolated using magnetic bead sorting on 0, 4, 15, 30, 40 days post MHV-3 infection. The cytotoxic effects of CD4-CD8- T cells on normal and infected hepatocytes, CD8+ T cells and unrelated-virus (murine cytomegalovirus, MCMV) infected CD8+ T cells were examined by non-radioactive cytotoxicity assay. The surface markers of CD4-CD8- T cells were determined by flow cytometry.


RESULTS
MHV-3 infected CD4-CD8- T cells showed significant cytotoxic effect on CD8+ T cells, but not on infected hepatocytes or MCMV infected CD8+ T cells. The analysis of cell surface markers demonstrated that the CD4-CD8- T cells are a completely new T cell subset.


CONCLUSIONS
CD4-CD8- T cells have significant cytotoxic effect on virus specific CD8+ T cells in MHV-3 infected C3H/Hej mice, which suggests that CD4-CD8- T cells have immune modulatory functions in the development of chronic viral hepatitis. The phenotype of these CD4-CD8- T cells detected by flow cytometry is TCR alpha beta +CD3+CD4- CD8- CD25- CD28- CD30- CD44+.
Wang
Xiao-Jing
XJ
Institute of Infectious Disease, Tongji Hospital of Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China.
Yan
Wei-Ming
WM
Zhang
Jiang-Guo
JG
Wang
Hong-Wu
HW
Zou
Yong
Y
Luo
Xiao-Ping
XP
Ning
Qin
Q