Cognate antigen signals control CD8+ T cell priming, expansion size and effector versus memory cell fates, however, it is not clear whether they can also modulate the functional features of memory CD8+ T cells.  We observed that OT-I cells that were primed with weak cognate antigen signals incorporate more cytokine signals, leading to a hypothesis that CD8+ T cells that receive weak TCR signals require cytokine signals to form functional memory. Using a previously described mouse model in which IL-2 signaling via its high affinity receptor CD25 is selectively impaired, the Il2ramut/mut mouse, we conducted a comparative analysis of gene expression and epigenetic landscape of Il2ramut/mut and WT OT-I memory cells that were primed with strong (Lm-Ova N4) versus weak (Lm-Ova T4). RNA seq data showed that both TCR and IL-2 priming signals have minimal effect on gene expression in resting memory CD8 T cells, but they significantly modify the epigenetic landscape of the memory CD8 T cells. These findings have important contributions to the current understanding of how priming signals program memory CD8 T cells in vivo. SOURCE: Shu Shien Chin (shushien.chin@einsteinmed.org) -  Albert Einstein College of Medicine

Pluto Bioinformatics

GSE152393: Next Generation Sequencing Facilitates Quantitative Analysis of WT and Il2ra mut/mut memory OT-I cell transcriptomes