Figure 5.

tHIVconsvX-specific CD8⁺ T-cell responses are beneficial in chronically infected treatment-naive patients. PBMCs responsive to tHIVconsvX peptide pools P1–P10 from treatment-naive patients in Japan chronically infected with HIV-1 clade B were enumerated in an IFN-γ ELISPOT assay and the frequencies of CD8⁺ and CD4⁺ T cells were determined by flow cytometry. Correlations between the magnitude (top) or breadth (bottom) and the viral load (left) or CD4⁺ cell counts (right) were statistically analyzed using Spearman's rank test. The P values are given above individual graphs. (a) Correlations in all patients (n = 120) and (b) in a subgroup of patients without the two known protective HLA alleles B*52:01 and B*67:01 (n = 77).