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Lee MJ, Blish CA. Defining the role of natural killer cells in COVID-19. Nat Immunol 2023; 24:1628-1638. [PMID: 37460639 PMCID: PMC10538371 DOI: 10.1038/s41590-023-01560-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2023] [Accepted: 06/08/2023] [Indexed: 09/20/2023]
Abstract
Natural killer (NK) cells are critical effectors of antiviral immunity. Researchers have therefore sought to characterize the NK cell response to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the virus that causes it, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The NK cells of patients with severe COVID-19 undergo extensive phenotypic and functional changes. For example, the NK cells from critically ill patients with COVID-19 are highly activated and exhausted, with poor cytotoxic function and cytokine production upon stimulation. The NK cell response to SARS-CoV-2 is also modulated by changes induced in virally infected cells, including the ability of a viral peptide to bind HLA-E, preventing NK cells from receiving inhibitory signals, and the downregulation of major histocompatibility complex class I and ligands for the activating receptor NKG2D. These changes have important implications for the ability of infected cells to escape NK cell killing. The implications of these findings for antibody-dependent NK cell activity in COVID-19 are also reviewed. Despite these advances in the understanding of the NK cell response to SARS-CoV-2, there remain critical gaps in our current understanding and a wealth of avenues for future research on this topic.
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Affiliation(s)
- Madeline J Lee
- Stanford Immunology Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA
| | - Catherine A Blish
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA.
- Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, San Francisco, CA, USA.
- Stanford Medical Scientist Training Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA.
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Schmitz RL, Tweed KE, Rehani P, Samimi K, Riendeau J, Jones I, Maly EM, Guzman EC, Forsberg MH, Shahi A, Capitini CM, Walsh AJ, Skala MC. Autofluorescence lifetime imaging classifies human lymphocyte activation and subtype. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2023:2023.01.23.525260. [PMID: 36747690 PMCID: PMC9900834 DOI: 10.1101/2023.01.23.525260] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/25/2023]
Abstract
New non-destructive tools are needed to reliably assess lymphocyte function for immune profiling and adoptive cell therapy. Optical metabolic imaging (OMI) is a label-free method that measures the autofluorescence intensity and lifetime of metabolic cofactors NAD(P)H and FAD to quantify metabolism at a single-cell level. Here, we investigate whether OMI can resolve metabolic changes between human quiescent versus IL4/CD40 activated B cells and IL12/IL15/IL18 activated memory-like NK cells. We found that quiescent B and NK cells were more oxidized compared to activated cells. Additionally, the NAD(P)H mean fluorescence lifetime decreased and the fraction of unbound NAD(P)H increased in the activated B and NK cells compared to quiescent cells. Machine learning classified B cells and NK cells according to activation state (CD69+) based on OMI parameters with up to 93.4% and 92.6% accuracy, respectively. Leveraging our previously published OMI data from activated and quiescent T cells, we found that the NAD(P)H mean fluorescence lifetime increased in NK cells compared to T cells, and further increased in B cells compared to NK cells. Random forest models based on OMI classified lymphocytes according to subtype (B, NK, T cell) with 97.8% accuracy, and according to activation state (quiescent or activated) and subtype (B, NK, T cell) with 90.0% accuracy. Our results show that autofluorescence lifetime imaging can accurately assess lymphocyte activation and subtype in a label-free, non-destructive manner.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Kelsey E. Tweed
- Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI, USA
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA
| | - Peter Rehani
- Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI, USA
| | | | | | - Isabel Jones
- Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI, USA
| | | | | | - Matthew H. Forsberg
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, USA
| | - Ankita Shahi
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, USA
| | - Christian M. Capitini
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, USA
- Carbone Cancer Center, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, USA
| | | | - Melissa C. Skala
- Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI, USA
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA
- Carbone Cancer Center, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI, USA
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Ivison GT, Vendrame E, Martínez-Colón GJ, Ranganath T, Vergara R, Zhao NQ, Martin MP, Bendall SC, Carrington M, Cyktor JC, McMahon DK, Eron J, Jones RB, Mellors JW, Bosch RJ, Gandhi RT, Holmes S, Blish CA. Natural Killer Cell Receptors and Ligands Are Associated With Markers of HIV-1 Persistence in Chronically Infected ART Suppressed Patients. Front Cell Infect Microbiol 2022; 12:757846. [PMID: 35223535 PMCID: PMC8866573 DOI: 10.3389/fcimb.2022.757846] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/12/2021] [Accepted: 01/21/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The latent HIV-1 reservoir represents a major barrier to achieving a long-term antiretroviral therapy (ART)-free remission or cure for HIV-1. Natural Killer (NK) cells are innate immune cells that play a critical role in controlling viral infections and have been shown to be involved in preventing HIV-1 infection and, in those who are infected, delaying time to progression to AIDS. However, their role in limiting HIV-1 persistence on long term ART is still uncharacterized. To identify associations between markers of HIV-1 persistence and the NK cell receptor-ligand repertoire, we used twin mass cytometry panels to characterize the peripheral blood NK receptor-ligand repertoire in individuals with long-term antiretroviral suppression enrolled in the AIDS Clinical Trial Group A5321 study. At the time of testing, participants had been on ART for a median of 7 years, with virological suppression <50 copies/mL since at most 48 weeks on ART. We found that the NK cell receptor and ligand repertoires did not change across three longitudinal samples over one year-a median of 25 weeks and 50 weeks after the initial sampling. To determine the features of the receptor-ligand repertoire that associate with markers of HIV-1 persistence, we performed a LASSO normalized regression. This analysis revealed that the NK cell ligands CD58, HLA-B, and CRACC, as well as the killer cell immunoglobulin-like receptors (KIRs) KIR2DL1, KIR2DL3, and KIR2DS4 were robustly predictive of markers of HIV-1 persistence, as measured by total HIV-1 cell-associated DNA, HIV-1 cell-associated RNA, and single copy HIV-RNA assays. To characterize the roles of cell populations defined by multiple markers, we augmented the LASSO analysis with FlowSOM clustering. This analysis found that a less mature NK cell phenotype (CD16+CD56dimCD57-LILRB1-NKG2C-) was associated with lower HIV-1 cell associated DNA. Finally, we found that surface expression of HLA-Bw6 measured by CyTOF was associated with lower HIV-1 persistence. Genetic analysis revealed that this was driven by lower HIV-1 persistence in HLA-Bw4/6 heterozygotes. These findings suggest that there may be a role for NK cells in controlling HIV-1 persistence in individuals on long-term ART, which must be corroborated by future studies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Geoffrey T Ivison
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States.,Department of Pathology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States.,Program in Immunology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Elena Vendrame
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Giovanny J Martínez-Colón
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Thanmayi Ranganath
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Rosemary Vergara
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Nancy Q Zhao
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States.,Program in Immunology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Maureen P Martin
- Basic Science Program, Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research, National, Cancer Institute, Frederick, MD, United States.,Laboratory of Integrative Cancer, Immunology, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD, United States
| | - Sean C Bendall
- Department of Pathology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Mary Carrington
- Basic Science Program, Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research, National, Cancer Institute, Frederick, MD, United States.,Laboratory of Integrative Cancer, Immunology, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD, United States.,Ragon Institute of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Harvard, Boston, MA, United States
| | - Joshua C Cyktor
- Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, United States
| | - Deborah K McMahon
- Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, United States.,Department of Infectious Diseases and Microbiology, University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health, Pittsburgh, PA, United States
| | - Joseph Eron
- Division of Infectious Diseases, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, United States
| | - R Brad Jones
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, NY, United States
| | - John W Mellors
- Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, United States
| | - Ronald J Bosch
- Center for Biostatistics in AIDS Research, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States
| | - Rajesh T Gandhi
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States.,Center for AIDS Research, Harvard University, Boston, MA, United States
| | - Susan Holmes
- Department of Statistics, School of Humanities and Sciences, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States
| | - Catherine A Blish
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States.,Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, San Francisco, CA, United States
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Wilk AJ, Lee MJ, Wei B, Parks B, Pi R, Martínez-Colón GJ, Ranganath T, Zhao NQ, Taylor S, Becker W, Jimenez-Morales D, Blomkalns AL, O’Hara R, Ashley EA, Nadeau KC, Yang S, Holmes S, Rabinovitch M, Rogers AJ, Greenleaf WJ, Blish CA. Multi-omic profiling reveals widespread dysregulation of innate immunity and hematopoiesis in COVID-19. J Exp Med 2021; 218:e20210582. [PMID: 34128959 PMCID: PMC8210586 DOI: 10.1084/jem.20210582] [Citation(s) in RCA: 119] [Impact Index Per Article: 39.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/12/2021] [Revised: 05/13/2021] [Accepted: 05/13/2021] [Indexed: 12/20/2022] Open
Abstract
Our understanding of protective versus pathological immune responses to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), is limited by inadequate profiling of patients at the extremes of the disease severity spectrum. Here, we performed multi-omic single-cell immune profiling of 64 COVID-19 patients across the full range of disease severity, from outpatients with mild disease to fatal cases. Our transcriptomic, epigenomic, and proteomic analyses revealed widespread dysfunction of peripheral innate immunity in severe and fatal COVID-19, including prominent hyperactivation signatures in neutrophils and NK cells. We also identified chromatin accessibility changes at NF-κB binding sites within cytokine gene loci as a potential mechanism for the striking lack of pro-inflammatory cytokine production observed in monocytes in severe and fatal COVID-19. We further demonstrated that emergency myelopoiesis is a prominent feature of fatal COVID-19. Collectively, our results reveal disease severity-associated immune phenotypes in COVID-19 and identify pathogenesis-associated pathways that are potential targets for therapeutic intervention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aaron J. Wilk
- Stanford Medical Scientist Training Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Stanford Immunology Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Madeline J. Lee
- Stanford Immunology Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Bei Wei
- Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Benjamin Parks
- Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Graduate Program in Computer Science, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Ruoxi Pi
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | | | - Thanmayi Ranganath
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Nancy Q. Zhao
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Shalina Taylor
- Department of Pediatrics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Cardiovascular Institute, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Vera Moulton Wall Center for Pulmonary Vascular Disease, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Winston Becker
- Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | | | | | - Andra L. Blomkalns
- Department of Emergency Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Ruth O’Hara
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Euan A. Ashley
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Kari C. Nadeau
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Sean N. Parker Center for Allergy and Asthma Research, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Samuel Yang
- Department of Emergency Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Susan Holmes
- Department of Statistics, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
| | - Marlene Rabinovitch
- Department of Pediatrics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Cardiovascular Institute, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Vera Moulton Wall Center for Pulmonary Vascular Disease, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - Angela J. Rogers
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
| | - William J. Greenleaf
- Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Department of Applied Physics, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
| | - Catherine A. Blish
- Stanford Medical Scientist Training Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
- Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, San Francisco, CA
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