CD4+ T CELL IMMUNITY IN MOTHER-CHILD PAIRS INFECTED WITH HEPATITIS C VIRUS

本子项目是利用由NIH/NCRR资助的中心赠款提供的资源的众多研究子项目之一。子项目和研究者（PI）可能已经从另一个NIH来源获得了主要资金，因此可以在其他CRISP条目中表示。列出的机构是中心的，不一定是研究者的机构。我们假设围产期获得HCV感染的儿童的良性肝病病程可能与与成人相比，这些儿童对HCV抗原的CD4+T细胞反应性提高有关。此外，我们将验证一个假设，即一种促进细胞免疫反应的调节细胞因子，在儿童的循环中比他们的母亲高。由于母子在基因上相似，感染的HCV毒株相同，因此母亲可以作为儿童的理想成人对照组。研究对象为20对均感染丙型肝炎的母子对和10对未感染的对照母子对。受试者，感染配对和对照组，将是在CHRMC胃肠病学诊所就诊的患者及其母亲，她们将在这些就诊中进行血液检查。儿童受试者必须年满一岁，体重超过7公斤。

This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. We hypothesize that the benign liver disease course in children who acquire HCV infection perinatally may be related to improved CD4+T cell responsiveness to HCV antigens in the these children compared to adults. In addition, we will test the hypothesis that a regulatory cytokine, which promotes the cellular immune response, is elevated in the circulation of children compared with their mothers. Since mother-child pairs are genetically similar and infected by the same HCV strain, the mothers serve as an ideal adult comparison group to the children. The research population will be twenty mother-child pairs who both are infected with Hepatitis C and 10 control mother-child pairs who are not infected. The subjects, infected pairs and control, will be patients and their mothers who are attending clinic visits in the CHRMC Gastroenterology Clinic and who will be having blood work done as part of these visits. The child subjects must be a t least one year of age and weigh more than 7 kg.