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Background The best form of protection against influenza is high-titred virus-neutralizing antibody specific for the challenge strain. However, this is not always possible to achieve by vaccination due to the need for predicting the emerging virus, whether it be a drift variant of existing human endemic influenza type A subtypes or the next pandemic virus, for incorporation into the vaccine. By activating additional arms of the immune system to provide heterosubtypic immunity, that is immunity active against all viruses of type A influenza regardless of subtype or strain, it should be possible to provide significant benefit in situations where appropriate antibody responses are not achieved. Although current inactivated vaccines are unable to induce heterosubtypic CD8+ T cell immunity, we have shown that lipopeptides are particularly efficient in this regard. Objectives To examine the role of vaccine-induced CD8+ T cells in altering the course of disease due to highly virulent H1N1 influenza virus in the mouse model. Methods The induction of influenza-specific CD8+ T cells following intranasal inoculation with lipopeptide vaccine was assessed by intracellular cytokine staining (ICS) and the capacity of these cells to reduce viral loads in the lungs and to protect against death after viral challenge was determined. Results and conclusions We show that CD8+ T cells are induced by a single intranasal vaccination with lipopeptide, they remain at substantial levels in the lungs and are efficiently boosted upon challenge with virulent virus to provide late control of pulmonary viral loads. Vaccinated mice are not only protected from death but remain active, indicative of less severe disease despite significant weight loss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both CD4+ and CD8+ T cells from mice infected with Mycobacterium avium suffered a high rate of apoptosis, beginning with the onset of the immune response and culminating in the loss of T cells from the tissues and loss of IFN-γ production. Fas expression increased over the course of infection on both T cell populations, as did their susceptibility to the induction of apoptosis in vitro by anti-Fas mAb. Nevertheless, although the rate of apoptosis among CD4+ T cells from infected mice was reduced to normal levels in lpr mice with a defective Fas, CD8+ T cells were unaffected, implying that Fas/FasL interaction was not important in these cells in vivo. Conversely, over-expression of B-cell lymphoma-2 (Bcl-2), which is known to protect T cells from apoptosis signalled through the TNF receptor or due to the withdrawal of cytokines, totally protected CD8+ T cells from infected mice but had no effect on CD4+. It is of interest that these two contrasting pathways of T-cell apoptosis operate at the same time during a single infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unlabelled: Although avian H5N1 influenza virus has yet to develop the capacity for human-to-human spread, the severity of the rare cases of human infection has warranted intensive follow-up of potentially exposed individuals that may require antiviral prophylaxis. For countries where antiviral drugs are limited, the World Health Organization (WHO) has developed a risk categorization for different levels of exposure to environmental, poultry, or human sources of infection. While these take into account the infection source, they do not account for the likely mode of virus entry that the individual may have experienced from that source and how this could affect the disease outcome. Knowledge of the kinetics and spread of virus after natural routes of exposure may further inform the risk of infection, as well as the likely disease severity. Using the ferret model of H5N1 infection, we compared the commonly used but artificial inoculation method that saturates the total respiratory tract (TRT) with virus to upper respiratory tract (URT) and oral routes of delivery, those likely to be encountered by humans in nature. We show that there was no statistically significant difference in survival rate with the different routes of infection, but the disease characteristics were somewhat different. Following URT infection, viral spread to systemic organs was comparatively delayed and more focal than after TRT infection. By both routes, severe disease was associated with early viremia and central nervous system infection. After oral exposure to the virus, mild infections were common suggesting consumption of virus-contaminated liquids may be associated with seroconversion in the absence of severe disease., Importance: Risks for human H5N1 infection include direct contact with infected birds and frequenting contaminated environments. We used H5N1 ferret infection models to show that breathing in the virus was more likely to produce clinical infection than swallowing contaminated liquid. We also showed that virus could spread from the respiratory tract to the brain, which was associated with end-stage disease, and very early viremia provided a marker for this. With upper respiratory tract exposure, infection of the brain was common but hard to detect, suggesting that human neurological infections might be typically undetected at autopsy. However, viral spread to systemic sites was slower after exposure to virus by this route than when virus was additionally delivered to the lungs, providing a better therapeutic window. In addition to exposure history, early parameters of infection, such as viremia, could help prioritize antiviral treatments for patients most at risk of succumbing to infection., (Copyright © 2016, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.)

Infection of C57BL/6 mice with Mycobacterium avium leads to the activation of both CD4+ and CD8+ gamma interferon (IFN-gamma)-producing T cells, although the CD8+ cells play no role in protection against infection. Using transfer of different lines of transgenic T cells with T-cell receptors (TCRs) which recognize irrelevant antigens, we show here that transferred CD8+ T cells from two of the three lines were activated to the same degree as the host cells, suggesting that the majority of the IFN-gamma-producing CD8+ T cells of the host represented bystander activation. The third line, specific for the male HY antigen, showed no activation. Activation required the participation of the CD28 coreceptor on T cells and was unaffected by the removal of CD44(hi) (memory phenotype) T cells. The transferred CD8+ T cells proliferated in vivo, although this was not essential for IFN-gamma production. Taken together, these data are highly reminiscent of homeostatic proliferation of TCR transgenic T cells upon transfer to lymphopenic hosts, and suggest low-affinity stimulation through the TCR, possibly by self peptides. The findings are discussed in relation to homeostatic proliferation and their significance in the possible induction of autoimmune disease.