High efficiency ex vivo cloning of antigen-specific human effector T cells.

While cloned T cells are valuable tools for the exploration of immune responses against viruses and tumours, current cloning methods do not allow inferences to be made about the function and phenotype of a clone's in vivo precursor, nor can precise cloning efficiencies be calculated. Additionally, there is currently no general method for cloning antigen-specific effector T cells directly from peripheral blood mononuclear cells, without the need for prior expansion in vitro. Here we describe an efficient method for cloning effector T cells ex vivo.