Selective increase of activation antigens HLA-DR and CD38 on CD45RO+ T lymphocytes during HIV-1 infection

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Abstract
SUMMARY: Infection with HIV results in a progressive depletion of CD4* T cells and leads to significant in vivo lymphocyte phenotype changes. In this regard, the expression of HLA-DR and CD38 on CD8* T cells has been shown to increase dramatically with disease progression. We investigated the expression of both aetivation markers on CD4* T cells in HIV-1-infected subjeets at different clinical stages of infection and compared the in vivo activation of CD4* T cells with parameters of viral activity and CD8* T cell activation. Eresh peripheral venous blood was obtained from 54 HIVinfeeted subjects and from 28 uninfected healthy controls. Three-colour immunophenotyping of the CD4’T Cell subset showed that the proportion of CD4* T cells expressing HLA-DR (10% in HIV negative controls) or CD38 (62%. in HIV-negative controls) was higher in asymptomatic (P < 0·05 for CD38) and symptomatic (P< 0.001 for HLA-DR and CD38) HIV-infected subjects than in controls, whereas the proportion of CD4* T cells expressing CD45RO (54% in controls) remained relatively unchanged. Simultaneous expression of HLA-DR and CD38 on CD4 * T cells increased from 2·3% in controls to 11% (P<0·001) in asymptomatic and 22% (P < 0·001) in symptomatic HIV-infected subjects. This relative increase of CD38 and HLA-DR expression occurred mainly on CD4* T cells co-expressing CD45RO. Changes in expression of HLA-DR and CD38 on CD4 * T cells correlated with similar changes on CD8 * T lymphocytes, with the presence of HIV antigen in the circulation, and with the disease stage of HIV infection.

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