Characterization of interferon regulatory factor-7 in defined subsets of human peripheral blood mononuclear cells and analysis of the effect of knockdown on HIV-1 infection
| dc.contributor.author | Harris, Angela | |
| dc.contributor.examiningcommittee | Yang, Xi (Medical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases) Ho, Emmanuel (Pharmacy) Soussi-Gounni, Abdel (Immunology) | en_US |
| dc.contributor.supervisor | Su, Ruey-Chyi (Medical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases) Ball, T. Blake (Medical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases) | en_US |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2017-02-06T19:51:26Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2017-02-06T19:51:26Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2017 | |
| dc.degree.discipline | Medical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases | en_US |
| dc.degree.level | Master of Science (M.Sc.) | en_US |
| dc.description.abstract | Introduction: Interferon regulatory factor-7 (IRF-7), the “master regulator” of type 1 interferon, has shown to orchestrate anti-viral immune responses via fine-tuning expression of interferons and interferon-stimulated genes. Methods: IRF-7 levels were examined using multi-parametric flow-cytometry in HIV-uninfected Manitoban donors and in HIV-infected and HIV-uninfected Kenyan volunteers from a well-characterized Kenyan sex worker cohort. IRF-7 expression level was reduced by IRF-7 specific siRNA or shRNA encoded in lentivirus and administered into ex-vivo CD4+ T cells by transfection or transduction. Results: In unstimulated PBMC, IRF-7 was constitutively expressed at low levels in every defined subset we examined. We observed less HIV-infected cells (~10%) with IRF-7 knockdown, suggesting that IRF-7 may play a role in HIV infection. Conclusions: Unexpectedly, it was found that even though IRF-7 had been implicated in orchestrating antiviral events, reducing IRF-7 expression in ex vivo CD4+ T cells did not increase the cellular susceptibility to productive HIV infection. | en_US |
| dc.description.note | February 2017 | en_US |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/1993/32103 | |
| dc.language.iso | eng | en_US |
| dc.rights | open access | en_US |
| dc.subject | IRF-7 | en_US |
| dc.subject | HIV-1 | en_US |
| dc.subject | PBMC | en_US |
| dc.title | Characterization of interferon regulatory factor-7 in defined subsets of human peripheral blood mononuclear cells and analysis of the effect of knockdown on HIV-1 infection | en_US |
| dc.type | master thesis | en_US |