Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 derived from cocultures of immature dendritic cells with autologous T cells carries T-cell-specific molecules on its surface and is highly infectious.

During the budding process, human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) acquires cell surface molecules; thus, the viral surface of HIV-1 reflects the antigenic pattern of the host cell. To determine the source of HIV-1 released from cocultures of dendritic cells (DC) with T cells, immature DC (imDC), mature DC (mDC), T cells, and their cocultures were infected with different HIV-1 isolates. The macrophage-tropic HIV-1 isolate Ba-L allowed viral replication in both imDC and mDC, whereas the T-cell-line-tropic primary isolate PI21 replicated in mDC only. By a virus capture assay, HIV-1 was shown to carry a T-cell- or DC-specific cell surface pattern after production by T cells or DC, respectively. Upon cocultivation of HIV-1-pulsed DC with T cells, HIV-1 exclusively displayed a typical T-cell pattern. Additionally, functional analysis revealed that HIV-1 released from imDC-T-cell cocultures was more infectious than HIV-1 derived from mDC-T-cell cocultures and from cultures of DC, T cells, or peripheral blood mononuclear cells alone. Therefore, we conclude that the interaction of HIV-1-pulsed imDC with T cells in vivo might generate highly infectious virus which primarily originates from T cells.