Oral Presentation 49th Annual Scientific Meeting of the Australian and New Zealand Society for Immunology 2021

Single-cell landscape of CD4+CD8+ double positive T cells in intestine and response to cancer immunotherapy (#46)

Hongjian Sun 1 , Yang Yang 1 2 , Jialei Gong 3 , Di Yu 1 2
  1. Shandong Artificial Intelligence Institute, Jinan, SHANDONG, China
  2. The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
  3. Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Fertility Regulation, Center of Assisted Reproduction and Embryology, University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen Hospital, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China

CD4 and CD8 co-receptors are co-expressed on a large number of thymic T cells during development but such CD4+CD8+ double-positive double-positive (DP) T cells are much rare in the peripheral. For a long time, peripheral mature T cells were thought to express CD4 or CD8 in a mutually exclusive manner. With the identification of CD4+CD8+ intraepithelial T lymphocytes abundantly in the intestine and the reports of other CD4+CD8+ DP T cells in circulation or non-lymphoid organs, a heterogeneous pool of CD4+CD8+ DP T cells emerges but their phenotype and function remain unclear and sometimes controversial. We analysed human intestinal T cells by scRNA-seq and identified phenotypically distinct CD4+CD8+ DP T cells including two distinct CD4+CD8αα+ T cell subsets and other CD4+CD8αβ+ T cell subsets closely related to regulator T (Treg) cells, follicular helper T (Tfh) cells, GZMK+ CD8+ T cells, CD161+ CD8+ T cells and proliferating CD8+ γδ T, suggesting a broad spectrum of CD4+CD8+ DP T cells than previously appreciated. We found CD8+ Treg cells were highly induced by immune checkpoint inhibitor therapies and particularly associated with the development of colitis, which might be driven by pro-inflammatory cytokines in particular IFNγ. Single-cell landscape of CD4+CD8+ DP T cells not only advances the current understanding the heterogeneity of their phenotypes and functions but also discovers potential biomarkers for response and adverse events to immunotherapy.