Frequencies of virus-specific CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T lymphocytes secreting gamma interferon after acute natural rotavirus infection in children and adults

Human rotavirus-specific CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T-cell responses in peripheral blood lymphocytes were studied using a flow cytometric assay that detects the intracellular accumulation of cytokines after short-term in vitro antigen stimulation. The frequencies of virus-specific T cells that secrete gamma interferon and interleukin-13 (IL-13) were determined in adults and children during the acute or convalescent phase of rotavirus-induced diarrhea, in asymptomatically infected adults and laboratory workers who worked with human stool samples containing rotavirus, and in healthy adults. Significantly higher frequencies of rotavirus-specific interferon gamma-secreting CD8⁺ and CD4⁺ T cells, but not IL-13-secreting T cells, were detected in symptomatically infected adults and exposed laboratory workers than in healthy adults and children with acute rotavirus diarrhea. The levels of rotavirus-specific T cells returned to levels found in healthy adults by 32 days after the onset of rotavirus diarrhea in most adult subjects. Children with rotavirus diarrhea had undetectable or very low levels of CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T cells that secrete gamma interferon. Adult cytomegalovirus-seropositive individuals had frequencies of cytomegalovirus-specific T cells that secrete gamma interferon that were approximately 20 times the level of rotavirus-specific T cells. This result suggests that rotavirus is a relatively poor inducer of circulating memory T cells that secrete gamma interferon. The frequencies of gamma interferon-secreting CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T cells and the frequencies of IL-13-secreting CD4⁺ T cells responding to the T-cell superantigen staphylococcal enterotoxin B (SEB) were lower in children than in adults. In both adults and children, the frequencies of CD4⁺ cells secreting gamma interferon in response to SEB were higher than the frequencies of cells secreting IL-13.