Cytomegalovirus Seropositivity Drives the CD8 T Cell Repertoire Toward Greater Clonality in Healthy Elderly Individuals

The deterioration in immune function with aging is thought to make a major contribution to the increased morbidity and mortality from infectious disease in old age. One aspect of immune senescence is the reduction in CD8 T cell repertoire as due to the accumulation of oligoclonal, memory T cells and a reduction in the naive T cell pool. CD8 T cell clonal expansions accumulate with age, but their antigenic specificity remains unknown. In this study, we show that in elderly individuals seropositivity for human CMV leads to the development of oligoclonal populations of CMV-specific CTL that can constitute up to one-quarter of the total CD8 T cell population. Furthermore, CMV-specific CTL have a highly polarized…

• MR
  Medical Research Council