Resistance to and Recovery from Lethal Influenza Virus Infection in B Lymphocyte–deficient Mice

In the adaptive immune response to most viruses, both the cellular and humoral arms of the immune system play complementary roles in eliminating virus and virus-infected cells and in promoting recovery. To evaluate the relative contribution of CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ effector T lymphocytes in virus clearance and recovery, we have examined the host response to lethal type A influenza virus infection in B lymphocyte–deficient mice with a targeted disruption in the immunoglobulin mu heavy chain. Our results indicate that naive B cell–deficient mice have a 50– 100-fold greater susceptibility to lethal type A influenza virus infection than do wild type mice. However, after priming with sublethal doses of influenza, immune B cell–deficient animals show an enhanced resistance to lethal virus infection. This finding indicates that an antibody-independent immune-mediated antiviral mechanism accounts for the increased resistance to lethal virus challenge. To assess the contribution of influenza-specific CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ effector T cells in this process, defined clonal populations of influenza-specific CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ effector T cells were adoptively transferred into lethally infected B cell–deficient mice. Cloned CD8⁺ effectors efficiently promoted recovery from lethal infection, whereas cloned CD4⁺ T cells conferred only partial protection. These results suggest that memory T lymphocytes can act independently of a humoral immune response in order to confer resistance to influenza infection in immune individuals. The potential implications of these results for vaccination against human influenza infection are discussed.