Dissecting the role of TGF-beta+ regulatory CD4+ T cells in pathogenesis of Marek's disease in chickens

白色血细胞是人体免疫系统的重要组成部分，用于对抗病毒、细菌和其他病原体的感染。我们的研究集中在一种称为T细胞的白色血细胞上。存在具有不同功能能力的不同类型的T细胞，例如，杀伤性T细胞识别并裂解癌细胞或感染细胞，而抑制性T细胞抑制免疫并抑制炎症反应。许多病原体已经学会了通过操纵抑制性T细胞来与宿主共存，因此它们可以逃脱免疫控制。我们对鸡中的抑制性T细胞知之甚少，因为我们没有特异性和稳定的标记物来识别鸡中的这些细胞。我们的研究小组最近基于一种称为TGF-β的抑制分子的表达，鉴定了一种新的鸡抑制性T细胞亚群。我们已经证明，这些细胞可能参与一种经济上重要的传染病，称为“马立克氏病”的鸡的发病机制。与人类相似，包括鸡在内的许多动物都会患上癌症，区别在于动物的癌症主要由病毒引起。马立克氏病（MD）是鸡的一种常见疾病，导致感染的T细胞转化和肿瘤在各种组织中生长，最终死亡。我们的数据表明，癌细胞类似于最近发现的抑制性T细胞，马立克氏病感染增加了鸟类中抑制性T细胞的数量。我们建议确定最近发现的抑制性T细胞是否是癌细胞的前体，以及这些细胞是否被病毒特异性靶向。我们还将探讨最近发现的抑制性T细胞的分子特征差异是否可以解释MDV感染的易感性。

White blood cells are a key part of the body's immune system to combat infections by viruses, bacteria and other pathogens. Our research is focused on a type of white blood cells called T cells. There are different types of T cells with distinct functional abilities, for example, killer T cells recognize and lyse cancer cells or infected cells, while suppressor T cells dampen immunity and suppress inflammatory responses. Many pathogens have learned to co-exist with the host by manipulating suppressor T cells to their advantage and thus they can escape immune control. We know very little about suppressor T cells in chicken, because we do not have specific and stable markers to identify these cells in chickens. A novel chicken suppressor T cell subpopulation has been recently identified, by our group, based on the expression of a suppressive molecule called TGF-beta. We have demonstrated that these cells may be involved in the pathogenesis of an economically important infectious disease called "Marek's disease" in chickens. Similar to humans, many animals including chickens develop cancer with the distinction that cancers in animals are mainly induced by viruses. Marek's disease (MD) is a common disease of chickens, causing transformation of the infected T cells and tumour growth in various tissues and eventually death. Our data show that cancer cells resemble the recently identified suppressor T cells and Marek disease infection increases the number of the suppressor T cells in the birds. We propose to determine whether the recently identified suppressor T cells are the precursor of cancer cells and if these cells are specifically targeted by the virus. We will also explore whether differences in molecular signature of the recently identified suppressor T cells can explain the susceptibility to MDV infection.