Related Articles Involvement of CD8(+) T cells in protective immunity against murine blood-stage infection with Plasmodium yoelii 17XL strain.

Eur J Immunol. 2010 Jan 25;

Authors: Imai T, Shen J, Chou B, Duan X, Tu L, Tetsutani K, Moriya C, Ishida H, Hamano S, Shimokawa C, Hisaeda H, Himeno K

In developing malaria vaccines, the most crucial step is to elucidate the mechanisms involved in protective immunity against the parasites. We found that CD8(+) T cells contribute to protective immunity against infection with blood-stage parasites of Plasmodium yoelii. Infection of C57BL/6 mice with P. yoelii 17XL was lethal, while all mice infected with a low-virulence strain of the parasite 17XNL acquired complete resistance against re-infection with P. yoelii 17XL. However, the host mice transferred with CD8(+) T cells from mice primed only with P. yoelii17XNL failed to acquire protective immunity. On the other hand, the irradiated host mice were completely resistant to P. yoelii 17XL infection, showing no grade of parasitemia when adoptively transferred with CD8(+) T cells from immune mice that survived infection with both P. yoelii XNL and, subsequently, P. yoelii 17XL. These protective CD8(+) T cells from immune WT mice had the potential to generate interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma), perforin and granzyme B. When mice deficient in IFN-gamma were used as donor mice for CD8(+) T cells, protective immunity in the host mice was fully abrogated, and the immunity was profoundly attenuated in perforin-deficient mice. Thus, CD8(+) T cells producing IFN-gamma and perforin appear to be involved in protective immunity against infection with blood-stage malaria.

PMID: 20101613 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]