Grupo de Inmunología Celular e Inmunogenética, Instituto de Investigaciones Médicas and Sede de Investigación Universitaria (SIU), Universidad de Antioquia, Medellín, Colombia.
Tuberculosis (Edinb). 2013 Mar;93(2):155-66. doi: 10.1016/j.tube.2012.12.002. Epub 2013 Jan 16.
Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the most important infectious diseases around the world. Several studies have focused on the identification of correlates of protection against TB. Most of them have concentrated on the study of IFN-γ due to its robust association with protection against TB. However, given the complexity of the immune response elicited after Mtb infection, other cytokines should also be considered. In the present study, we evaluated Th1 and Th17 responses and their association with the protection or development of active disease. Therefore, non infected individuals (nonTBi), latently infected individuals (LTBi) and patients with active TB (ATB) were studied. The evaluation of the number of cytokine producing cells by ELISPOT showed a higher number of IFN-γ-producing cells in ATB patients, but no differences were found regarding the number of IL-17 producing cells among studied groups. The evaluation of IFN-γ, IL-2, TNF-α and IL-17 producing CD4+ and CD8+ T cells at 1 day and 6 days of stimulation with mycobacterial antigens suggests the presence of functional signatures associated with latency or active TB. The results presented herein suggest the possible use of the evaluation of Th1-type cytokines, such as IFN-γ and/or TNF-α, as a correlate of protection against TB; however, these results need to be validated for other groups.
结核病（TB）是全球最重要的传染病之一。有几项研究集中于鉴定针对 TB 的保护相关因素。由于 IFN-γ与对 TB 的保护作用具有很强的相关性，因此大多数研究都集中在对其的研究上。然而，鉴于 Mtb 感染后引发的免疫反应非常复杂，其他细胞因子也应该被考虑。在本研究中，我们评估了 Th1 和 Th17 反应及其与保护性或发展为活动性疾病的关系。因此，研究了未感染个体（nonTBi）、潜伏感染个体（LTBi）和活动性 TB 患者（ATB）。通过 ELISPOT 评估细胞因子产生细胞的数量显示，ATB 患者 IFN-γ 产生细胞数量较高，但在研究组之间，IL-17 产生细胞的数量没有差异。在刺激 1 天和 6 天后评估 IFN-γ、IL-2、TNF-α 和 IL-17 产生的 CD4+和 CD8+T 细胞，提示存在与潜伏或活动性 TB 相关的功能特征。本研究结果表明，评估 Th1 型细胞因子（如 IFN-γ和/或 TNF-α）作为针对 TB 的保护相关因素是可能的；然而，这些结果需要在其他人群中进行验证。
