Deconvoluting the T Cell Response to SARS-CoV-2: Specificity Versus Chance and Cognate Cross-Reactivity
SARS-CoV-2 infection takes a mild or clinically inapparent course in the majority of humans who contract this virus. After such individuals have cleared the virus, only the detection of SARS-CoV-2-specific immunological memory can reveal the exposure, and hopefully the establishment of immune protec...
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Published in | Frontiers in immunology Vol. 12; p. 635942 |
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Main Authors | , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Frontiers Media S.A
28.05.2021
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Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | SARS-CoV-2 infection takes a mild or clinically inapparent course in the majority of humans who contract this virus. After such individuals have cleared the virus, only the detection of SARS-CoV-2-specific immunological memory can reveal the exposure, and hopefully the establishment of immune protection. With most viral infections, the presence of specific serum antibodies has provided a reliable biomarker for the exposure to the virus of interest. SARS-CoV-2 infection, however, does not reliably induce a durable antibody response, especially in sub-clinically infected individuals. Consequently, it is plausible for a recently infected individual to yield a false negative result within only a few months after exposure. Immunodiagnostic attention has therefore shifted to studies of specific T cell memory to SARS-CoV-2. Most reports published so far agree that a T cell response is engaged during SARS-CoV-2 infection, but they also state that in 20-81% of SARS-CoV-2-unexposed individuals, T cells respond to SARS-CoV-2 antigens (mega peptide pools), allegedly due to T cell cross-reactivity with Common Cold coronaviruses (CCC), or other antigens. Here we show that, by introducing irrelevant mega peptide pools as negative controls to account for chance cross-reactivity, and by establishing the antigen dose-response characteristic of the T cells, one can clearly discern between cognate T cell memory induced by SARS-CoV-2 infection vs. cross-reactive T cell responses in individuals who have not been infected with SARS-CoV-2. |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 Edited by: Peter Katsikis, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Netherlands Reviewed by: Yvonne Mueller, Erasmus Medical Center, Netherlands; Amit Awasthi, Translational Health Science and Technology Institute (THSTI), India This article was submitted to Immunological Memory, a section of the journal Frontiers in Immunology |
ISSN: | 1664-3224 1664-3224 |
DOI: | 10.3389/fimmu.2021.635942 |