METHODS: Ninety-four HIV-infected patients were recruited to the study; a longitudinal cohort of patients recruited just prior to commencing cART and followed up for 48 weeks (n = 27), and a cross-sectional cohort (n = 67) consisting of patients with sIR (CD4 T-cell count < 350 cells/μL) and oIR (CD4 T-cell count > 500 cells/μL) after a minimum of 2 years on cART. Controls (n = 29) consisted of HIV-negative individuals. IFN-γ ELISPOT responses against HPV16 and HPV52 E6 were correlated to clinical characteristics, anal and oral HPV carriage, T-cell maturational subsets, markers of activation, senescence and T-regulatory cells.
RESULTS: HPV16 and HPV52 E6-specific T-cell responses were detected in only one of 27 patients (3.7%) during the initial phase of immune recovery. After at least 2 years of cART, those who achieved oIR had significantly higher E6-specific responses (9 of 34; 26.5%) compared with those with sIR (2 of 32; 6.3%) (P = 0.029). Apart from higher CD4 T-cell counts and lower CD4 T-cell activation, no other immunological correlates were associated with the detection of HPV16 and HPV52 E6-specific responses.
CONCLUSIONS: HPV16 and HPV52 E6-specific IFN-γ T-cell responses, a correlate of protective immunity, were detected more frequently among HIV-infected patients who achieved optimal immune recovery on cART (26.5%) compared with those with suboptimal recovery (6.3%).
RESULTS: A. burmanicus stem extract and M. modestum leaf extract were capable of inhibiting growth of P. falciparum when used at 200 µg/mL compared to chloroquine. The extracts at effective concentrations, did not affect the viability of PBMCs. These results support further need for characterization of active compounds from specific Annonaceae plants in order to exploit their components for potential malaria treatment.
Methods: Microarray expression dataset GSE22255 was retrieved from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. It includes messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) expression data for the peripheral blood mononuclear cells of 20 controls and 20 IS patients. The bioconductor-package 'affy' was used to calculate expression and a pairwise t-test was applied to screen DEGs (P < 0.01). Further, GSEA was used to determine the enrichment of DEGs specific to gene ontology (GO) annotations.
Results: GSEA analysis revealed 21 genes to be significantly plausible gene markers, enriched in multiple pathways among all the DEGs (n = 881). Ten gene sets were found to be core enriched in specific GO annotations. JunD, NCX3 and fibroblast growth factor receptor 4 (FGFR4) were under-represented and glycoprotein M6-B (GPM6B) was persistently over-represented.
Conclusion: The identified genes are either associated with the pathophysiology of IS or they affect post-IS neuronal regeneration, thereby influencing clinical outcome. These genes should, therefore, be evaluated for their utility as suitable markers for predicting IS in clinical scenarios.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: The PBMC (n = 7) were cultured either in RPMI-1640 containing L-glutamine and 50 units/ml Penicillin-Streptomycin (BM) or in BM with either AuHS or FBS. Viability, proliferation and differentiation of PBMC were evaluated. Paracrine factors present in the secretomes (n = 6) were analysed using ProcartaPlex Human Cytokine panel (17 plex). Ingenuity Pathway Analysis (IPA) was performed to predict activation or inhibition of biological functions related to tissue regeneration.
RESULTS: The viability of PBMC that were cultured with FBS supplement was significantly reduced at 96 h compared to those at 0 and 24 h (P