Modelling pathways of CD8+ T-cell differentiation

Abstract

In an immune response to infection, naïve T lymphocytes proliferate and give rise to a heterogeneous population of effector and memory cells. How is this diversity generated, and how can it be manipulated? Answering these questions requires an understanding of the lineage relationships between different effector and memory-cell subsets, but these relationships remain to be identified definitively. In this issue of the European Journal of Immunology, a study moves us closer to this goal by combining a mathematical model and data from influenza infections in mice to support the hypothesis that CD8(+) T-cell differentiation is strongly coupled to cell division.