Journal
BLOOD
Volume 125, Issue 4, Pages 731-739Publisher
AMER SOC HEMATOLOGY
DOI: 10.1182/blood-2014-07-589150
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Funding
- Leukaemia and Lymphoma Research
- Cancer Research UK
- Cancer Research Institute
- Medical Research Council UK
- Department of Health
- Cancer Research United Kingdom
- Cancer Research UK [12100] Funding Source: researchfish
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Cytomegalovirus (CMV) remains a significant cause of morbidity after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). Clinical risk varies according to a number of factors, including recipient/donor CMV serostatus. Current dogma suggests risk is greatest in seropositive recipient (R1)/seronegative donor (D2) transplants and is exacerbated by T-cell depletion. We hypothesized that in the setting of reduced-intensity T-cell-depleted conditioning, recipient-derived CMV-specific T cells escaping deletion may contribute significantly to CMV-specific immunity and might therefore also influence chimerism-status. We evaluated 105 recipients of alemtuzumab-based reduced-intensity HSCT and collated details on CMV infection episodes and T-cell chimerism. We used CMV-specific HLA multimers to enumerate CMV-specific T-cell numbers and select cells to assess chimerism status in a subset of R1/D2 and R1/seropositive donor patients. We show that in R1/D2 patients, CMV-specific T cells are exclusively of recipient origin, can protect against recurrent CMV infections, and significantly influence the chimerism status toward recipients. The major findings were replicated in a separate validation cohort. T-cell depletion in the R1/D2 setting may actually, therefore, foster more rapid reconstitution of protective antiviral immunity by reducing graft-vs-host directed alloreactivity and the associated elimination of the recipient T-cell compartment. Finally, conversion to donor chimerism after donor lymphocytes is associated with clinically occult transition to donor-derived immunity.
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