Establishment of functional influenza virus-specific CD8 T cell memory pools after intramuscular immunization

Abstract

The emergence of the avian-origin influenza H7N9 virus and its pandemic potential has highlighted the ever-present need to develop vaccination approaches to induce cross-protective immunity. In this study, we examined the establishment of cross-reactive CD8+ T cell immunity in mice following immunization with live A/Puerto Rico/8/1934 (PR8; H1N1) influenza virus via two non-productive inoculation routes. We found that immunization via the intramuscular (IM) route established functional influenza-virus specific memory CD8+ T cell pools capable of cross-reactive recall responses. Epitope-specific primary, memory and recall CD8+ T-cell responses induced by the IM route, highly relevant to human..