Jpn. J. Infect. Dis., 57, 220-223, 2004
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Short Communication
Stimulation of Virus-Specific T Cell Responses by Dendritic Cell Vaccination in the Chronic Phase of Simian AIDS Models
Moriaki Kato1,2, Hiroko Igarashi1, Akiko Takeda1, Shigeo Horie3, Eiji Higashihara2 and Tetsuro Matano1,4*
1Department of Microbiology, Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-0033, 2Department of Urology, School of Medicine, Kyorin University, Tokyo 181-8611, 3Department of Urology, School of Medicine, Teikyo University, Tokyo 173-8605 and 4AIDS Research Center, National Institute of Infectious Diseases, Tokyo 162-8640, Japan.
(Received August 16, 2004. Accepted September 9, 2004)
*Corresponding author: Mailing address: Department of Microbiology, Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan. Tel: +81-3-5841-3407, Fax: +81-3-5841-3374, E-mail: matano@m.u-tokyo.ac.jp
SUMMARY: Virus-specific CD8+ cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) responses play an important role in the control of immunodeficiency virus infections. Therapeutic immunization with antigen-pulsed dendritic cells (DC) may be a promising strategy for stimulating CTL. However, decreases in DC number and function have been suggested in the host persistently infected with the virus, and this may constitute an obstacle to DC-based immunotherapy in the chronic phase. In this study, we show that virus-specific CTL responses were augmented by therapeutic immunization with inactivated virus-pulsed autologous DC in rhesus macaques that had maintained prophylactic vaccine-based control of virus replication for more than three years after simian or simian-human immunodeficiency virus challenge. Our results indicate the potential of DC in the chronic phase for efficiently stimulating CTL in vivo, suggesting the feasibility of therapeutic DC immunization for replenishing virus-specific CTL responses in the chronic phase after the prophylactic vaccine-based control of primary immunodeficiency virus infection.