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CD4+CD25+CD127low/− T Cells: A More Specific Treg Population in Human Peripheral Blood

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Abstract

The quantitative identification and enrichment of viable regulatory T cells (Treg) requires reliable surface markers that are selectively expressed on Treg. Foxp3 is the accepted marker of nTreg, but it cannot be used to isolate cells for functional studies. In this study, we compared four staining profiles of Treg, including CD4+CD25high T cells, CD4+CD39+ T cells, CD4+CD73+ T cells, and CD4+CD25+CD127low/− T cells. We found that CD4+CD25+CD127low/− T cells expressed the highest level of Foxp3 and had the strongest correlation with CD4+CD25+Foxp3+ T cells, the accepted identifying characteristics for “real” nTreg cells. Moreover, functional data showed that CD4+CD25+CD127low/− T cells could effectively suppress the proliferation of CD4+CD25− T cells, suggesting that compared with the other three populations, CD4+CD25+CD127low/− T cells best fit the definition of naturally occurring regulatory T cells in human peripheral blood. Finally, we showed that CD4+CD25+CD127low/− can be used to quantitate Treg cells in individuals with systemic lupus erythematosus supporting the use of CD4+CD25+CD127low/− to identify human Treg cells.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Dr. Yi-ping Wang (Centre for Transplantation and Renal Research, University of Sydney at Westmead Millennium Institute) for the technical assistance and Professor Fan Pan (Immunology and Hematopoiesis Division, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine) for the paper revision. This study was supported by a Project Grant funding from the National Ministry of Science and Technology (2008BAI59B02) and the Natural Science Grant funding from Anhui Provincial Government (090413129).

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, Affiliated Anhui Provincial Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei, Anhui, 230001, China

    Ning Yu, Xiaomei Li, Weiya Song, Dongmei Li, Daliang Yu & Xiangpei Li

  2. Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Beijing, 100730, China

    Xiaofeng Zeng, Mengtao Li & Xiaomei Leng

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  1. Ning Yu
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  2. Xiaomei Li
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  9. Xiangpei Li
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Correspondence to Xiangpei Li.

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Ning Yu and Xiaomei Li contribute equally to this work.

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Yu, N., Li, X., Song, W. et al. CD4+CD25+CD127low/− T Cells: A More Specific Treg Population in Human Peripheral Blood. Inflammation 35, 1773–1780 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10753-012-9496-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10753-012-9496-8

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