Limited recognition of Mycobacterium tuberculosis-infected macrophages by polyclonal CD4 and CD8 T cells from the lungs of infected mice

Immune responses following Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) infection or vaccination are frequently assessed by measuring T cell recognition of crude Mtb antigens, recombinant proteins, or peptide epitopes. We previously showed that not all Mtb-specific T cells recognize Mtb-infected macrophages. Thus, an important question is what proportion of T cells elicited by Mtb infection recognize Mtb-infected macrophages. We answer this question by developing a modified elispot assay using viable Mtb-infected macrophages, a low multiplicity of infection and purified T cells. In C57BL/6 mice, CD4 and CD8 T cells were classically MHC restricted. Comparable frequencies of T cells that recognize Mtb-infected macrophages were determined using interferon-γ elispot and intracellular cytokine staining, and lung CD4 T cells more sensitively recognized Mtb-infected macrophages than lung CD8 T cells. Compared to the numbers of Mtb antigen-specific T cells for antigens such as ESAT-6 and TB10.4, low frequencies of pulmonary CD4 and CD8 T cells elicited by aerosolized Mtb infection recognize Mtb-infected macrophages. Finally, we demonstrate that BCG vaccination elicits T cells that recognize Mtb-infected macrophages. We propose that the frequency of T cells that recognize infected macrophages could correlate with protective immunity and may be an alternative approach to measuring T cell responses to Mtb antigens.