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Bone Marrow of Persistently Hepatitis C Virus-Infected Individuals Accumulates Memory CD8⁺ T Cells Specific for Current and Historical Viral Antigens: A Study in Patients with Benign Hematological Disorders¹

Department of Internal Medicine and Clinical Oncology, University of Bari Medical School, Bari, Italy

The role of virus-specific T cells in hepatitis C virus (HCV) pathogenesis is not clear. Existing knowledge on the frequency, phenotype, and behavior of these cells comes from analyses of blood and liver, but other lymphoid compartments that may be important sites for functionally mature T cells have not yet been analyzed. We studied HCV-specific T cells from bone marrow, in comparison to those from peripheral blood and liver biopsy tissue, from 20 persistently HCV-infected patients with benign hematological disorders. Bone marrow contained a sizeable pool of CD8⁺ T cells specific for epitopes from structural and nonstructural HCV proteins. These cells displayed the same effector memory phenotype as liver-derived equivalents and the same proliferative potential as blood-derived equivalents but had greater antiviral effector functions such as Ag-specific cytotoxicity and IFN- production. These features were not shared by influenza virus-specific CD8⁺ T cells in the same bone marrow samples. Despite their highly differentiated phenotype and activated status, some bone marrow-resident HCV-specific CD8⁺ T cells were not directed against the infecting virus but, instead, against historical HCV Ags (i.e., viral species of a previous infection or minor viral species of the current infection). These findings provide a snapshot view of the distribution, differentiation, and functioning of virus-specific memory T cells in patients with persistent HCV infection.

The costs of publication of this article were defrayed in part by the payment of page charges. This article must therefore be hereby marked advertisement in accordance with 18 U.S.C. Section 1734 solely to indicate this fact.

¹ This study was supported by a grant from the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Puglia (Bari, Italy) and the Associazione Italiana per la Ricerca sul Cancro (Milan, Italy).

² Address correspondence and reprint requests to Dr. Vito Racanelli, Department of Internal Medicine and Clinical Oncology, University of Bari Medical School, Policlinico, 11 Piazza G. Cesare, Bari, Italy. E-mail address: v.racanelli{at}dimo.uniba.it

³ Abbreviations used in this paper: HCV, hepatitis C virus; BM, bone marrow; HBsAg, hepatitis B surface Ag; PB, peripheral blood; SOD, superoxide dismutase; BM-derived mononuclear cell; IHL, intrahepatic lymphocyte; DC, dendritic cell.

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