Abstract 4622: Characterization of sulfatide reactive type II NKT cells from mouse lung
Authors: Pasquet Lise , Kato Shingo , Adams Tony , Sharrow Susan , Davies-Hill Theresa , Jaffe Elaine , Zheng Xia , Suzuki Motoshi , Kovalovsky Damian , Berzofsky Jay , Terabe Masaki 
Published: July 2017

The immune system plays a major role in the elimination of tumors. CD8 T cell infiltration is known to be a good prognostic indicator. The development of therapies based on checkpoint inhibitor antibodies was an important breakthrough in increasing survival by limiting the exhaustion of cytotoxic cells and increasing tumor cell eradication. However, the immune system also contains regulatory cells that protect the organism from inappropriate activation of immune cells against self-antigens. Thus, the fact that tumor cells are autologous leads regulatory cells to inhibit the activation of anti-tumor cytotoxic cells and thus increase tumor escape. Therefore, understanding the function and the activation of regulatory cells might help to develop therapies to limit the activation of regulatory cells in order to increase tumor clearance.

Natural killer T (NKT) cells are lymphocytes with features of natural killer (NK) and of T cells placing them at the interface of innate and adaptive immunity. Like NK cells, they rapidly produce cytokines after stimulation, orienting the immune response. As T cells, they express a T cell receptor (TCR) that allows the recognition of specific lipids presented by the non-classical MHC-I molecule CD1d. According to their TCR usage, two populations of NKT cells are described: type I and type II. All type I NKT cells express a semi-invariant TCR (Valpha24Jalpha18 in humans, Valpha14Jalpah18 in mice) that recognizes α-galactosylceramide (αGalCer). They can be identified with the αGalCer-loaded CD1d tetramer. In contrast, type II NKT cells express a more diverse TCR repertoire. There is no currently identified lipid antigen recognized by all type II NKT cells, making their identification more difficult. A fraction of them recognize sulfatide. By using sulfatide-loaded CD1d-tetramers, we observed for the first time that sulfatide-reactive type II NKT cells were enriched in the lung, a major site of tumor metastasis. Moreover, we previously showed that in vivo stimulation of type II NKT cells with sulfatide increased the number of tumor nodules in the lung. An in-depth phenotype analysis revealed that they were CD4 or CD8 single positive cells, like conventional T cells, whereas type I NKT cells are either CD4+CD8- or double negative. Type II NKT cells do not express PLZF, the master regulator of NKT cell development and exist in PLZF-/- mice contrary to type I NKT cells. We showed that type II NKT cells also expressed markers of myeloid cells, c-Kit, CD11b and Ly6C even though histological analysis revealed lymphocytic morphology. Interestingly, at steady state, type II NKT cells expressed granzyme A but not granzyme B or perforin. The in vivo injection of sulfatide increased the expression of the activation markers CD69 and CD44 as well as granzyme A. Since the regulatory functions of type II NKT cells have been shown to be critical in tumor immunity, the detailed characterization of these cells could help to develop a new immunotherapy for cancer.

Citation Format: Lise Pasquet, Shingo Kato, Tony Adams, Susan Sharrow, Theresa Davies-Hill, Elaine Jaffe, Xia Zheng, Motoshi Suzuki, Damian Kovalovsky, Jay Berzofsky, Masaki Terabe. Characterization of sulfatide reactive type II NKT cells from mouse lung [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 4622. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-4622