The response of T lymphocytes plays a critical role in the immune system's fight against SARS-CoV-2, which is a consensus in the scientific and medical communities. But what is the state of antigen-reactive T cells at different sites in the body of COVID-19 patients? And which gene expression changes do they undergo during the course of disease? Little is known about this.<\/p>\n
To answer these questions, the researchers applied a new methodological trick, 'reverse phenotyping', based on single-cell analyses of reactive T-cell receptors. Using the reverse phenotyping and integration of this data with single cell RNA-seq data sets obtained from respiratory material from several patient cohorts, it was possible for the first time to determine how the activity state of SARS-COV-2 reactive T cells in the lung changes during the course of the disease. This revealed how SARS-CoV-2 reactive T cell clones differ in the acute phase of infection (with virus still detectable) versus the resolution phase (virus already eliminated).<\/p>\n
The novel 'reverse phenotyping' approach used in this study could become a powerful tool for the identification of antigen-reactive T cell receptors. This is important for the rapid development of therapies and vaccines against emergent viruses such as SARS-CoV-2.<\/p>\n
This work, initiated by Dr. Kilian Schober (TU Munich) and Dr. Herbert Schiller (ILBD\/CPC-M, DZL site Munich), demonstrates once again how the rapid initiation of collaborations between multiple research institutions in this pandemic has led to new insights. Researchers from ILBD\/CPC-M, ICB (both Helmholtz Zentrum M\u00fcnchen), TU M\u00fcnchen, LMU Klinikum, Asklepios Klinik M\u00fcnchen-Gauting and Uni Erlangen were involved in the work.<\/p>\n
Link to publication: 'Single-cell RNA sequencing reveals ex vivo signatures of SARS-CoV-2-reactive T cells through 'reverse phenotyping'' (https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-021-24730-4<\/a>)<\/p>\n