Single-cell immune repertoire sequencing of B and T cells in murine models of infection and autoimmunity.

Adaptive immune repertoires are composed by the ensemble of B and T-cell receptors within an individual, reflecting both past and current immune responses. Recent advances in single-cell sequencing enable recovery of the complete adaptive immune receptor sequences in addition to transcriptional information. Here, we recovered transcriptome and immune repertoire information for polyclonal T follicular helper cells following lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV) infection, CD8+ T cells with binding specificity restricted to two distinct LCMV peptides, and B and T cells isolated from the nervous system in the context of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis.

Tissue-resident memory CD8 T cells cooperate with CD4 T cells to drive compartmentalized immunopathology in the CNS.

In chronic inflammatory diseases of the central nervous system (CNS), immune cells persisting behind the blood-brain barrier are supposed to promulgate local tissue destruction. The drivers of such compartmentalized inflammation remain unclear, but tissue-resident memory T cells (T) represent a potentially important cellular player in this process. Here, we investigated whether resting CD8 T persisting after cleared infection with attenuated lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV) can initiate immune responses directed against cognate self-antigen in the CNS.

Cold exposure protects from neuroinflammation through immunologic reprogramming.

Autoimmunity is energetically costly, but the impact of a metabolically active state on immunity and immune-mediated diseases is unclear. Ly6C monocytes are key effectors in CNS autoimmunity with an elusive role in priming naive autoreactive T cells. Here, we provide unbiased analysis of the immune changes in various compartments during cold exposure and show that this energetically costly stimulus markedly ameliorates active experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE).

Persistence of self-reactive CD8+ T cells in the CNS requires TOX-dependent chromatin remodeling.

Self-reactive CD8 T cells are important mediators of progressive tissue damage in autoimmune diseases, but the molecular program underlying these cells' functional adaptation is unclear. Here we characterize the transcriptional and epigenetic landscape of self-reactive CD8 T cells in a mouse model of protracted central nervous system (CNS) autoimmunity and compare it to populations of CNS-resident memory CD8 T cells emerging from acute viral infection. We find that autoimmune CD8 T cells persisting at sites of self-antigen exhibit characteristic transcriptional regulation together with distinct epigenetic remodeling.

Neurons under T Cell Attack Coordinate Phagocyte-Mediated Synaptic Stripping.

Inflammatory disorders of the CNS are frequently accompanied by synaptic loss, which is thought to involve phagocytic microglia and complement components. However, the mechanisms accounting for aberrant synaptic connectivity in the context of CD8 T cell-driven neuronal damage are poorly understood. Here, we profiled the neuronal translatome in a murine model of encephalitis caused by CD8 T cells targeting antigenic neurons.