Letter abstract


Nature Medicine 15, 293 - 299 (2009)
Published online: 15 February 2009 | Corrected online: 6 April 2009 | doi:10.1038/nm.1935



There is a Corrigendum (April 2009) associated with this Letter.

Effector memory T cell responses are associated with protection of rhesus monkeys from mucosal simian immunodeficiency virus challenge

Scott G Hansen1, Cassandra Vieville1, Nathan Whizin1, Lia Coyne-Johnson1, Don C Siess1, Derek D Drummond1, Alfred W Legasse1, Michael K Axthelm1, Kelli Oswald2, Charles M Trubey2, Michael Piatak Jr2, Jeffrey D Lifson2, Jay A Nelson1, Michael A Jarvis1 & Louis J Picker1

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The rapid onset of massive, systemic viral replication during primary HIV or simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) infection and the immune evasion capabilities of these viruses pose fundamental problems for vaccines that depend upon initial viral replication to stimulate effector T cell expansion and differentiation1, 2, 3, 4, 5. We hypothesized that vaccines designed to maintain differentiated effector memory T cell (TEM cell) responses5, 6 at viral entry sites might improve efficacy by impairing viral replication at its earliest stage2, and we have therefore developed SIV protein-encoding vectors based on rhesus cytomegalovirus (RhCMV), the prototypical inducer of life-long TEM cell responses7, 8, 9. RhCMV vectors expressing SIV Gag, Rev-Tat-Nef and Env persistently infected rhesus macaques, regardless of preexisting RhCMV immunity, and primed and maintained robust, SIV-specific CD4+ and CD8+ TEM cell responses (characterized by coordinate tumor necrosis factor, interferon-gamma and macrophage inflammatory protein-1beta expression, cytotoxic degranulation and accumulation at extralymphoid sites) in the absence of neutralizing antibodies. Compared to control rhesus macaques, these vaccinated rhesus macaques showed increased resistance to acquisition of progressive SIVmac239 infection upon repeated limiting-dose intrarectal challenge, including four macaques who controlled rectal mucosal infection without progressive systemic dissemination. These data suggest a new paradigm for AIDS vaccine development—vaccines capable of generating and maintaining HIV-specific TEM cells might decrease the incidence of HIV acquisition after sexual exposure.

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  1. Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute, Departments of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology and Pathology, and the Oregon National Primate Research Center, Oregon Health & Science University, 505 Northwest 185th Avenue, Beaverton, Oregon 97006, USA.
  2. AIDS and Cancer Virus Program, Science Applications International Corporation Frederick, National Cancer Institute–Frederick, 1050 Boyles Street, Building 535, Suite 510, Frederick, Maryland 21702, USA.

Correspondence to: Louis J Picker1 e-mail: pickerl@ohsu.edu

* In the version of this article initially published, a "left" and "right" designation was switched in the legend for Figure 4d. The legend should read "FCICA of peripheral blood CD8+ T cells from the four protected vaccinees, examining the response of these cells to SIV proteins that were (Rev-Tat-Nef) or were not (Pol and Vif) expressed by the administered RhCMV vectors before (left) and 133 d after (right) initiation of the SIVmac239 intrarectal challenge protocol." The error has been corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of the article.

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