When a pathogen infects its host, there is usually an activation of the innate and adaptive immune responses, necessary for bacterial clearance. Innate immunity is the first line of defense that prevents most infections. Innate immunity distinguish in a precise way elements that are conserved among broad groups of microorganisms (pathogen-associated molecular patterns, PAMPS)1. The mechanisms of innate immunity include physical barriers such as skin, chemicals barriers (antimicrobial peptides, lysozyme) and the innate leukocytes, which include the phagocytes (macrophages, neutrophils, and dendritic cells), mast cells, eosinophils, basophils, and natural killer cells2. These cells identify and eliminate pathogens, either by attacking them through contact or via phagocytosis, which includes pathogen engulfing and killing. This system does not allow lifelong defense, in contrast to adaptive immunity, which confer immunological memory against pathogens. The adaptive immune system is the second line of defense and is able to recognize and react to specific antigens of multiple microbial and non-microbial substances3. The main components of the adaptive immune system are the lymphocytes, which include B and T cells. B cells are involved in the humoral response, secreting antibodies against pathogens or exogenous proteins. However, T cells represent the cell-mediated immunity, modulating the immune response with cytokines secretion or killing pathogen-infected cells4.
Antigen presenting cells (APCs) including dendritic cells or macrophages, constituents of the innate immune system, can recognize phagocytose pathogens and process bacterial components into antigens, which are presented at the cell surface by the Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC)5-7. After APCs have phagocytized pathogens, they usually migrate to the draining lymph nodes, where they interact with T cells. T lymphocytes can recognize specific peptide-MHC complexes by their T cell receptors. The immune synapse (IS) occurs in the interface between an antigen-loaded APC and a lymphocyte during antigen presentation8,9. Some bacteria can survive phagocytosis and disseminate systematically within APCs. In this view, infected APCs serve as bacterial reservoirs or "Trojan horses" that facilitate bacterial spread10. The intimate contact between APCs and lymphocytes that take place during the course of IS formation also function as a platform for exchange of part of membranes, genetic material and exosomes and can be hijacked for some viruses to infect T cells; this process is called transinfection11-13.
Some pathogenic bacteria (Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella enterica and Shigella flexneri) are able to invade T lymphocytes in vivo and modify their behaviour14-16 . We have recently described that T lymphocytes are also able to capture bacteria by transinfection from previously infected dendritic cells (DCs) during the course of antigen presentation16. T cell bacterial capture by transinfection exceedingly more effective (1,000-4,000x) than direct infections. T cells capture pathogen and non-pathogen bacteria indicating than transinfection is a process driven by T cells. Strikingly, transinfected T (tiT) cells rapidly killed the captured bacteria and did so more efficiently than professional phagocytes16. These results, which break a dogma of immunology, show that the cells of adaptive immunity can perform functions that were supposedly exclusive of the innate immunity. In addition, we showed that tiT cells secrete large amounts of pro-inflammatory cytokines and protect from bacterial infections in vivo.
Here we present the different protocols used to study the bacterial transinfection process in a mouse model. This model is based on the use of CD4+ T cells from transgenic OTII mice, which bear a TCR specific for peptide 323-339 of OVA (OVAp) in the context of I-Ab17 that interact specifically with bacterial-infected bone marrow-derived DCs (BMDCs)18,19 loaded with OVAp, forming stable immune synapses.
T cell transinfection can be visualized and tracked using fluorescence microscopy. Additionally, flow cytometry can be used for detecting infected cells by taking advantage of the fluorescence emitted by bacteria expressing green fluorescent protein (GFP)16,20. Moreover, T cell transinfection can be quantified by a more sensitive approach, the gentamicin survival assay that allows measurement of a large number of events. Gentamicin is an antibiotic that cannot penetrate eukaryotic cells. Therefore, using this antibiotic allows differentiation of intracellular bacteria that survived the antibiotic addition from extracellular ones that were killed21.