Telomere length as an indicator of the robustness of B- and T-cell response to influenza in older adults
Open accessAbstract
BACKGROUND: Telomeres provide a key mechanism for protecting the integrity of chromosomes and their attrition after cell division and during aging are evident in lymphocytes. However, the significance of telomere shortening in age-associated decline of immune function is unknown. METHODS: We selected 22 HLA-A2-positive healthy older adults who have relatively short or long telomere lengths to compare their antibody response against the influenza vaccine, and their CD8(+) T-cell response against an influenza antigen. RESULTS: B cells from individuals with a robust antibody response to the influenza vaccine had significantly longer telomeres than those with a poor antibody response. Monocyte-derived antigen-presenting cells of both short and long telomere groups induced similar expansions of influenza M1-specific CD8(+) T cells. Vaccination did not increase M1-specific CD8(+) T cells in blood, but M1-specific CD8(+) T cells from the long telomere group exhibited significantly greater expansion in vitro than those from the short telomere group. Finally, M1-specific CD8(+) T cells that underwent more expansions had significantly longer telomeres than cells with fewer divisions. CONCLUSIONS: Telomere length is positively associated with a robust lymphocyte response, and telomere attrition may contribute to the age-associated decline of adaptive immunity.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Proliferative responses of influenza M1-specific CD8+ T cells after TIV vaccination inversely correlated with telomere length in peripheral blood mononuclear cells, consistent with cumulative homeostatic proliferation constraining expansion of antigen-specific CD8+ T cells.
“The proliferative responses of influenza M1-specific CD8+ T cells after TIV vaccination inversely correlated to telomere length in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (Najarro et al., 2015), consistent with the notion that cumulative homeostatic proliferation constrains the expansion of antigen-specific CD8+ T cells”
From Successful and Maladaptive T Cell Aging (2017) · cites this paper as Najarro et al., 2015
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
The citation lists haven’t been fetched yet
References 45 · Cited by 83
- Authors
- Najarro, K., Nguyen, H., Chen, G., Xu, M., Alcorta, S., Yao, X., Zukley, L., Metter, E. J., Truong, T., Lin, Y., Li, H., Oelke, M., Xu, X., Ling, S. M., Longo, D. L., Schneck, J., Leng, S., Ferrucci, L., & Weng, N.-P.
- Affiliations
- Johns Hopkins University (US)
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US)
- National Institutes of Health (US)
- Corresponding author
- Najarro, Kevin
- ORCID
- Venue
- Journal of Infectious Diseases
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2015-03-31
- Volume
- 212
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- 1261-1269
- ISSN
- 0022-1899 (ISSN-L)
- 1537-6613
- PMC
- PMC4577042
- OpenAlex
- W2080919991
- Cited by
- 83
- References
- 45
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 7 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 11 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 2
- FWCI
- 6.63
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Licence
- public-domain
- Locations
- The Journal of Infectious Diseases (publishedVersion, public-domain)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, public-domain)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, public-domain)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health
- National Institute on Aging (ZIAAG000112, ZIAAG000756)
- National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (R01AI108907)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Physiology › Telomeres, Telomerase, and Senescence
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Epidemiology › Influenza Virus Research Studies
- Life Sciences › Immunology and Microbiology › Immunology › T-cell and B-cell Immunology
- Keywords
- telomere length, telomere shortening, influenza vaccine response, antibody response, CD8+ T cell responses, B cells, older adults, immunosenescence, antigen-presenting cells, HLA-A2, lymphocyte proliferation
- MeSH terms
- Age Factors, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Aging, Antigen-Presenting Cells, B-Lymphocytes, Female, Humans, Influenza, Human, Influenza Vaccines, Male, HLA-A2 Antigen, CD8-Positive T-Lymphocytes, Telomere Shortening
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
