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. 1994 Jun;96(3):528–534. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2249.1994.tb06061.x

Age-related increase in the fraction of CD27-CD4+ T cells and IL-4 production as a feature of CD4+ T cell differentiation in vivo.

E W Nijhuis 1, E J Remarque 1, B Hinloopen 1, T Van der Pouw-Kraan 1, R A Van Lier 1, G J Ligthart 1, L Nagelkerken 1
PMCID: PMC1534577  PMID: 7911751

Abstract

The influence of ageing on phenotype and function of CD4+ T cells was studied by comparing young (19-28 years of age) and aged (75-84 years of age) donors that were selected using the SENIEUR protocol to exclude underlying disease. An age-related increase was observed in the relative number of memory cells, not only on the basis of a decreased CD45RA and increased CD45RO expression, but also on the basis of a decrease in the fraction of CD27+CD4+ T cells. Our observation that the absolute number of CD45RO+CD4+ T cells was increased, while absolute numbers of CD27-CD4+ T cells remained unchanged in aged donors, indicates that the latter subset does not merely reflect the size of the CD45RO+CD4+ T cell pool. The increased fraction of memory cells in the aged was functionally reflected in an increased IL-4 production and T cell proliferation, when cells were activated with the combination of anti-CD2 and anti-CD28, whereas IL-2 production was comparable between both groups. No differences were observed with respect to proliferative T cell responses or IL-2 production using plate-bound anti-CD3 or phytohaemagglutinin (PHA). The observation that IL-4 production correlated with the fraction of memory cells in young donors but not in aged donors suggests different functional characteristics of this subset in aged donors.

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Selected References

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