La. Napolitano et al., Increased production of IL-7 accompanies HIV-l-mediated T-cell depletion: implications for T-cell homeostasis, NAT MED, 7(1), 2001, pp. 73-79
Citations number
46
Categorie Soggetti
Research/Laboratory Medicine & Medical Tecnology","Medical Research General Topics
We hypothesized that HIV-1-mediated T-cell loss might induce the production
of factors that are capable of stimulating lymphocyte development and expa
nsion. Here we perform cross-sectional (n = 168) and longitudinal (n = 11)
analyses showing that increased circulating levels of interleukin (IL)-7 ar
e strongly associated with CD4+ T lymphopenia in HIV-1 disease. Using immun
ohistochemistry with quantitative image analysis, we demonstrate that IL-7
is produced by dendritic-like cells within peripheral lymphoid tissues and
that IL-7 production by these cells is greatly increased in lymphocyte-depl
eted tissues. We propose that IL-7 production increases as part of a homeos
tatic response to T-cell depletion.