Name: phagosome migration and velocity measured in live primary human macrophages infected with hiv-1
Uploaded: 2016-09-05T15:00:00
Description: Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Phagosome Migration and Velocity Measured in Live Primary Human Macrophages Infected with HIV-1 at JoVE.com

We thank Dr Jamil Jubrail for reading the manuscript. This work was supported by grants from CNRS, Inserm, Universit&#233; Paris Descartes, Agence Nationale de la Recherche (2011 BSV3 025 02), Fondation pour la Recherche M&#233;dicale (FRM DEQ20130326518 including a doctoral fellowship for GLB) and Agence Nationale de Recherche sur le SIDA et les h&#233;patites virales (ANRS, including a post-doctoral fellowship for CD) to FN. A. Dumas was supported by doctoral fellowships from Universit&#233; Paris Descartes and Sidaction.

The protocol has to be carried out in strict accordance with national and international legislations and local regulations. Blood from healthy donors that gave their consent to donate blood for research purposes has been obtained from Blood Transfusion Centers with which the Institutions have signed agreement. Special protections must be taken when using human blood. Experiments with HIV-1 must be performed in a biosafety level 3 or 2 (BSL-3 or 2) laboratory according to local legislation.
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This technique has several critical steps. Firstly, the preparation of hMDMs and their infection by HIV-1 is critical because the percentage of infection is donor dependent. Of note, we have decided to use macrophages that are not polarized in vitro prior to infection, because the status of macrophages potentially encountered by the virus in vivo has not been well characterized so far. We checked the expression of several surface markers, indicating that the macrophages are neither M1 nor M2, and verifi...

Macrophages play a major role in the innate immune system and in homeostasis. They are professional phagocytes that internalize and eliminate pathogens and debris by a process called phagocytosis 1,2. The phagosome, the closed compartment that forms after the engulfment of particulate material, undergoes a series of fusion and fission events with endocytic compartments, leading to a degradative compartment called the phagolysosome. This compartment has an acidic pH, due to the acquisition of proton-pumping v-ATPases, contains hydrolytic enzymes and is enriched in lysosomal-associated membrane proteins (LAMPs). The maturation of phagosomes is accompanied by their migration on microtubules 3,4 towards the cell center to reach a perinuclear location where lysosomes are accumulated.
Many pathogens have been reported to hijack phagosome maturation, including bacteria with intracellular lifestyles that modify the vacuolar environment where they reside 5. The Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV)-1 targets macrophages in addition to T cells. As macrophages are resistant to the cytopathic effects of the virus, unlike T cells, they can be considered as a reservoir for the virus. In addition, macrophages infected with HIV-1 show defective phagocytic functions and contribute to the emergence of opportunistic diseases. In particular, severe invasive non-typhoidal Salmonella disease caused by Salmonella Typhimurium ST313 has been prevalent for the last three decades in sub-Saharan African children or adults infected with HIV 6. It has been estimated that the risk of developing tuberculosis is more than 20 times greater in people living with HIV than among those without HIV infection. 
For all these reasons, it is important to better define the molecular mechanisms underlying the phagocytic defects in HIV-infected macrophages. We have shown that the uptake of particulate material, opsonized particles, bacteria or fungi, was inhibited in HIV-infected macrophages 7. Given that this inhibition is partial, we then set out to analyze the fate of the internalized phagosomes in HIV infected human macrophages 8. Because phagosome maturation is tightly connected with migration to the cell center and fusion with lysosomes, a defect in phagosomal maturation can be due to modifications of the trafficking modalities in the infected cell. The method described here uses IgG-opsonized Sheep Red Blood Cells (IgG-SRBCs) as a model to target receptor-mediated phagocytosis and in particular receptors for the Fc portion of immunoglobulins (FcR). These particles are easier to image in bright field (BF) than latex beads because extracellular and intracellular SRBCs show different refraction properties 9. To measure the velocity of phagosomes moving towards the nucleus in HIV-infected macrophages, we used a fluorescent virus 10 and set up a simple manual tracking method that is described here. The method does not require advanced programming and simply uses ImageJ. It is amenable to adherent cells and any type of particle or pathogen that can be visualized with bright field microscopy or with fluorescent imaging.

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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Falcon 100mm TC-Treated Cell Culture Dish</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Corning</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">353003</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">For viral production</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Glass Bottom Dishes 35 mm uncoated 1.5</td>
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			<td style="width:124px;">Thermo Fischer Scientific</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Corning. Inc. 353934</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">For human monocyte-derived macrophages</td>
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			<td style="width:245px;">a neutral, highly branched, high-mass, hydrophilic polysaccharide in solution for density centrifugation</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">DPBS, no calcium, no magnesium</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Thermo Fischer Scientific</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">14190-094</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Room temperature</td>
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		<tr height="68">
			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Dulbecco&#39;s Modified Eagle Medium (DMEM) 1X, liquid (High Glucose)</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">GIBCO, Molecular probes</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">31966-021</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at 4&#176;C ; for HEK cells culture</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">RPMI 1640 medium GLUTAMAX&#160; Supplement</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Life technologies</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">61870-010</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at 4&#176;C; for hMDMs culture</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">F&#339;tal Calf Serum (FCS)&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Eurobio</td>
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			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at -20&#176;C ; decomplemented</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Penicillin-Streptomycin (10,000 U/mL)</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Thermo Fischer Scientific</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">15140-122</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at -20&#176;C ; for hMDMs culture</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">RPMI 1640 medium, no phenol red (10x500 ml)</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Life technologies</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">11835-105</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Warm in 37&#176;C water bath before use ; for phagocytosis assay</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">FuGENE6 Transfection Reagent</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Promega</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">E2692</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at 4&#176;C ; for viral production</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Sheep red blood cells (SRBCs)</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Eurobio</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">DSGMTN00-0Q</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved in Alsever buffer at 4&#176;C before use</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Anti-sheep red blood cells IgG</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">MP Biomedicals</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">55806</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at 4&#176;C</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Bovine Serum Albumin heat shock fraction, pH 7, &#8805;98%&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Sigma</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">A7906</td>
			<td style="width:245px;">Conserved at -20&#176;C</td>
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		<tr height="68">
			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Inverted microscope DMI600</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Leica</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Confocal Spinning Disk Unit&#160; CSU-X1M1</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">491 nm 50mW laser</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">COBOLT CALYPSO</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">HCX PL APO CS Objectif</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Leica</td>
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			<td style="width:245px;">Objective lens ; Magnification 100x ; Numerical aperture 1.40 ; Immersion oil</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">CoolSnap HQ2 (FireWire) Camera</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Photometrics</td>
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			<td style="width:245px;">Pixel size 6.45 x 6.45 &#181;m ; Definition 1392 x 1040 ; Encoding the image in 14 Bit</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">Metamorph 7.7.5 software</td>
			<td style="width:124px;">Molecular Devices</td>
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			<td style="width:245px;">For the control of the microscope</td>
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			<td height="68" style="height:68px;width:212px;">GraphPad Prism software</td>
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phagosome migration and velocity measured in live primary human macrophages infected with hiv-1

Macrophages are phagocytic cells that play a major role at the crossroads between innate and specific immunity. They can be infected by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-1 and because of their resistance to its cytopathic effects they can be considered to be persistent viral reservoirs. In addition, HIV-infected macrophages exhibit defective functions that contribute to the development of opportunistic diseases.
The exact mechanism by which HIV-1 impairs the phagocytic response of macrophages was unknown. We had previously shown that the uptake of various particulate material by macrophages was inhibited when they were infected with HIV-1. This inhibition was only partial and phagosomes did form within HIV-infected macrophages. Therefore, we focused on analyzing the fate of these phagosomes. Phagosome maturation is accompanied by migration of these compartments towards the cell center, where they fuse with lysosomes, generating phagolysosomes, responsible for degradation of the ingested material. We used IgG-opsonized Sheep Red Blood Cells as a target for phagocytosis. To measure the speed of centripetal movement of phagosomes in individual HIV-infected macrophages, we used a combination of bright field and fluorescence confocal microscopy. We established a method to calculate the distance of phagosomes towards the nucleus, and then to calculate the velocity of the phagosomes. HIV-infected cells were identified thanks to a GFP-expressing virus, but the method is applicable to non-infected cells or any type of infection or treatment.

FcR-mediated phagocytosis by HIV-1-infected and non-infected hMDMs is described here using IgG-opsonized SRBCs as model targets (Figure 1). The critical steps of this protocol are the preparation of hMDMs and the infection with HIV-1. Indeed, the yield and quality of differentiated macrophages varies among donors, as well as the infection rate with efficiencies in the range of 10-40%. In addition, the preparation of IgG-opsonized-SRBCs is also important to avoid damaging ...

Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Phagosome Migration and Velocity Measured in Live Primary Human Macrophages Infected with HIV-1 at JoVE.com

Phagosome Migration and Velocity Measured in Live Primary Human Macrophages Infected with HIV-1

We describe a method to measure the velocity of phagosomes moving towards the cell center in living cells infected with or without the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) type 1, using spinning disk confocal fluorescence microscopy to identify fluorescent infected cells and bright field microscopy to detect phagosomes.

Macrophages are phagocytic cells that play a major role at the crossroads between innate and specific immunity. They can be infected by the human ...

The overall goal of this analysis is to quantify phagosome velocity in HIV-1 infected macrophages using a simple manual tracking method. The advantage of this protocol is to provide an easy method to calculate the relative movements of groups of objects within a cell that can be either moving or deformed. This method provides insight into the movement of phagosomes in GFP-positive infected macrophages but it could be used for other intercellular compartments in fluorescently tagged cells.After infecting human monocyte-derived macrophages and opsonizing sheep-bred blood cells, according to the text protocol, set up a phagocytosis assay using a confocal imaging system, such as a spinning disc microscope, equipped with a heating chamber at 37 degrees Celsius, with carbon dioxide. Prior to the experiment, turn on the heating chamber to heat the microscope stage to 37 degrees Celsius. Then turn on the microscope and computer, and load the imaging software.Optimize the imaging settings, such as scanning speed, magnification, resolution, et cetera, to have at least one cell per field, and to image one frame every minute between 60 to 120 minutes. Place the imaging dish on the microscope stage. Adjust the focus and the location to find only one whole HIV-1 infected macrophage in the field.Use appropriate excitation and emission settings based on the used imagine system and probe. Include a bright field channel. Optimize its appearance by adjusting the exposure time.Next, remove the imaging dish and add one milliliter of sheep-bred blood cell, or SRBC suspension, at seven times tenth of the sixth SRBCs per milliliter, to the dish. Centrifuge the dish at 500 times g for two minutes at room temperature to synchronize phagocytosis, then record the time at the end of the centrifugation, and return the dish to the stage. Optimize the focus and set the top and bottom of the stack with a step distance of 0.3 micrometers.Start acquisition of the Z stacks of GFP and BF images throughout the thickness of the cell, and save the time-lapse video in the native file format of the imaging system. To carry out video editing, in the video editing software, click on the drop-down menu Apps and on the tab Review Multidimensional Data. To open the file, click on Select Base File, then on Select Directory.In the Data Sets box, select the acquisition to analyze and click on View. To represent the infection in a Z projection, in the Wavelengths box, select the 491 nanometer wavelength and click on the Z projection tab with all planes. Next, to analyze a time sequence, in the Wavelengths box select BF wavelength and choose the optimal plane on the Z axis to distinguish external SRBCs, internal SRBCs, and the nucleus.Save the video montages by clicking on the Selection Xs tab and then on Load Images. Finally, save the loaded images in tif format. After downloading the Image J manual tracking plugin, open the plugin in Image J, then open the image sequence to be analyzed.Enter the settings, such as time interval, which represents the amount of time between adjacent frames, and the XY calibration, which represents the distance per pixel. To start the tracking, click on Add Track, and click on an SRBC center at the first time when it is internalized. The next frame appears automatically.For convenience, to see SRBCs on the BF channel, use the brightness and contrast window during the tracking. Continue to click on the SRBC center in all frames to have different positions during the time. Between each SRBC tracking, click End Track and then Add Track to begin a new track.The tracking number will change in the second column of the results table. Start to track the nucleus to have its position in all frames by clicking on its center as performed previously. Save the data in a spreadsheet, then open it in spreadsheet software, and create a new spreadsheet file.Transfer into this new file the time, and the X and Y coordinates of the SRBC and the nucleus. Finally, use the spreadsheet software to calculate the traveled distance of phagosomes containing SRBCs towards the nucleus, and the velocity of the phagosomes during the first fives minutes after internalization of SRBCs according to the text protocol. Analysis of phagosome movement in living HIV-infected macrophages in real time using spinning disc confocal microscopy, is shown here.The settings for the bright field channel are critical to see the nucleus and for discriminating the external from the internalized SRBCs. This graph plots the distance traveled for a phagosome in non-infected HMDMs in the first five minutes after internalization of an SRBC versus time. The velocity of the phagosome is the slope of the linear regression curve shown here.Finally, in this study, it was observed that the phagosome velocity during the first five minutes after internalization in HIV-infected HMDMs is lower compared to non-infected HMDMs. These methods demonstrated that phagosome movement to the cell center, and therefore phagosome maturation into phagolysosomes, was impaired in HIV-infected macrophages. After its acquisition, a cell can be further processed for correlative electron microscopy or the whole-cell population can be fixed for classical immunofluorescence microscopy and statistical analysis.Phagocytosis is very sensitive to temperature and therefore the temperature within the heating chamber and the culture dish medium should be maintained at a constant 37 degrees Celsius throughout the procedure. Don't forget that working with pathogens can be hazardous and precautions such as working in a bio-safety room, and wearing personal protection equipment should be taken according to local legislation.

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Research

JoVE Journal

Immunology and Infection

Genotypic Inference of HIV-1 Tropism Using Population-based Sequencing of V3

Background: Prior to receiving a drug from CCR5-antagonist class in HIV therapy, a patient must undergo an HIV tropism test to confirm that his or her viral population uses the CCR5 coreceptor for cellular entry, and not an alternative coreceptor. One approach to tropism testing is to examine the sequence of the V3 region of the HIV envelope, which interacts with the coreceptor.
Methods: Viral RNA is extracted from blood plasma. The V3 region is amplified in triplicate with nested reverse transcriptase-PCR. The amplifications are then sequenced and analyzed using the software, RE_Call. Sequences are then submitted to a bioinformatic algorithm such as geno2pheno to infer viral tropism from the V3 region. Sequences are inferred to be non-R5 if their geno2pheno false positive rate falls below 5.75%. If any one of the three sequences from a sample is inferred to be non-R5, the patient is unlikely to respond to a CCR5-antagonist.

HIV tropism can be inferred from the V3 region of the viral envelope. V3 is PCR amplified in triplicate using nested RT-PCR, sequenced, and interpreted using bioinformatic software. Samples with with 1 or more sequence(s) with low g2P scores are classified as non-R5 virus.

Background: Prior to receiving a drug from CCR5-antagonist class in HIV therapy, a patient must undergo an HIV tropism test to confirm that his or her ...

Preparation and Use of HIV-1 Infected Primary CD4+ T-Cells as Target Cells in Natural Killer Cell Cytotoxic Assays

Natural killer (NK) cells are a vital component of the innate immune response to virus-infected cells. It is important to understand the ability of NK cells to recognize and lyse HIV-1 infected cells because identifying any aberrancy in NK cell function against HIV-infected cells could potentially lead to therapies that would enhance their cytolytic activity. There is a need to use HIV-infected primary T-cell blasts as target cells rather then infected-T-cell lines in the cytotoxicity assays. T-cell lines, even without infection, are quite susceptible to NK cell lysis. Furthermore, it is necessary to use autologous primary cells to prevent major histocompatibility complex class I mismatches between the target and effector cell that will result in lysis. Early studies evaluating NK cell cytolytic responses to primary HIV-infected cells failed to show significant killing of the infected cells 1,2. However, using HIV-1 infected primary T-cells as target cells in NK cell functional assays has been difficult due the presence of contaminating uninfected cells 3. This inconsistent infected cell to uninfected cell ratio will result in variation in NK cell killing between samples that may not be due to variability in donor NK cell function. Thus, it would be beneficial to work with a purified infected cell population in order to standardize the effector to target cell ratios between experiments 3,4. Here we demonstrate the isolation of a highly purified population of HIV-1 infected cells by taking advantage of HIV-1's ability to down-modulate CD4 on infected cells and the availability of commercial kits to remove dead or dying cells 3-6. The purified infected primary T-cell blasts can then be used as targets in either a degranulation or cytotoxic assay with purified NK cells as the effector population 5-7. Use of NK cells as effectors in a degranulation assay evaluates the ability of an NK cell to release the lytic contents of specialized lysosomes 8 called "cytolytic granules". By staining with a fluorochrome conjugated antibody against CD107a, a lysosomal membrane protein that becomes expressed on the NK cell surface when the cytolytic granules fuse to the plasma membrane, we can determine what percentage of NK cells degranulate in response to target cell recognition. Alternatively, NK cell lytic activity can be evaluated in a cytotoxic assay that allows for the determination of the percentage of target cells lysed by release of 51Cr from within the target cell in the presence of NK cells.

Cytotoxicity assays to measure natural killer cell lytic responses to HIV-infected cells is limited by the purity of the target cells. We demonstrate here the isolation of a highly purified population of HIV-1 infected primary T-cell blasts by taking advantage of HIV-1 s ability to down-modulate CD4.

 Natural killer (NK) cells are a vital component of the innate immune response to virus-infected cells. It is important to understand the ability of NK ...

Amplifying and Quantifying HIV-1 RNA in HIV Infected Individuals with Viral Loads Below the Limit of Detection by Standard Clinical Assays

Amplifying viral genes and quantifying HIV-1 RNA in HIV-1 infected individuals with viral loads below the limit of detection by standard assays (below 50-75 copies/ml) is necessary to gain insight to viral dynamics and virus host interactions in patients who naturally control the infection and those who are on combination antiretroviral therapy (cART). 
Here we describe how to amplify viral genomes by single genome sequencing (the SGS protocol) 13, 19 and how to accurately quantify HIV-1 RNA in patients with low viral loads (the single-copy assay (SCA) protocol) 12, 20. 
The single-copy assay is a real-time PCR assay with sensitivity depending on the volume of plasma being assayed. If a single virus genome is detected in 7 ml of plasma, then the RNA copy number is reported to be 0.3 copies/ml. The assay has an internal control testing for the efficiency of RNA extraction, and controls for possible amplification from DNA or contamination. Patient samples are measured in triplicate.
The single-genome sequencing assay (SGS), now widely used and considered to be non-labor intensive 3, 7, 12, 14, 15,is a limiting dilution assay, in which endpoint diluted cDNA product is spread over a 96-well plate. According to a Poisson distribution, when less than 1/3 of the wells give product, there is an 80% chance of the PCR product being resultant of amplification from a single cDNA molecule. SGS has the advantage over cloning of not being subjected to resampling and not being biased by PCR-introduced recombination 19. However, the amplification success of SCA and SGS depend on primer design. Both assays were developed for HIV-1 subtype B, but can be adapted for other subtypes and other regions of the genome by changing primers, probes, and standards.

Quantifying levels of HIV-1 RNA in plasma and sequencing single HIV-1 genomes from individuals with viral loads below the limit of detection (50-75 copies/ml) is difficult. Here we describe how to extract and quantify plasma viral RNA using a real time PCR assay that reliably measures HIV-1 RNA down to 0.3 copies/ml and how to amplify viral genomes by single genome sequencing, from samples with very low viral loads.

Amplifying viral genes and quantifying HIV-1 RNA in HIV-1 infected individuals with viral loads below the limit of detection by standard assays (below ...

In vitro Uncoating of HIV-1 Cores

The genome of the retroviruses is encased in a capsid surrounded by a lipid envelope. For lentiviruses, such as HIV-1, the conical capsid shell is composed of CA protein arranged as a lattice of hexagon. The capsid is closed by 7 pentamers at the broad end and 5 at the narrow end of the cone1, 2. Encased in this capsid shell is the viral ribonucleoprotein complex, and together they comprise the core.
Following fusion of the viral membrane with the target cell membrane, the HIV-1 is released into the cytoplasm. The capsid then disassembles releasing free CA in the soluble form3 in a process referred to as uncoating. The intracellular location and timing of HIV-1 uncoating are poorly understood. Single amino-acid substitutions in CA that alter the stability of the capsid also impair the ability of HIV-1 to infect cells4. This indicates that the stability of the capsid is critical for HIV-1 infection.
HIV-1 uncoating has been difficult to study due to lack of availability of sensitive and reliable assays for this process. Here we describe a quantitative method for studying uncoating in vitro using cores isolated from infectious HIV-1 particles. The approach involves isolation of cores by sedimentation of concentrated virions through a layer of detergent and into a linear sucrose gradient, in the cold. To quantify uncoating, the isolated cores are incubated at 37&deg;C for various timed intervals and subsequently pelleted by ultracentrifugation. The extent of uncoating is analyzed by quantifying the fraction of CA in the supernatant. This approach has been employed to analyze effects of viral mutations on HIV-1 capsid stability4, 5, 6. It should also be useful for studying the role of cellular factors in HIV-1 uncoating.

In vitro Uncoating of HIV-1 Cores

Uncoating is an essential step in the early phase of the HIV-1 life cycle and is defined as the disassembly of the capsid shell and the release of the viral ribonucleoprotein complex (vRNP). Here, we demonstrate techniques for isolating intact cores from HIV-1 virions and for quantifying their uncoating in vitro.

The genome of the retroviruses is encased in a capsid surrounded by a lipid envelope. For lentiviruses, such as HIV-1, the conical capsid shell is ...

An In vitro Co-infection Model to Study Plasmodium falciparum-HIV-1 Interactions in Human Primary Monocyte-derived Immune Cells

Plasmodium falciparum, the causative agent of the deadliest form of malaria, and human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1) are among the most important health problems worldwide, being responsible for a total of 4 million deaths annually1. Due to their extensive overlap in developing regions, especially Sub-Saharan Africa, co-infections with malaria and HIV-1 are common, but the interplay between the two diseases is poorly understood. Epidemiological reports have suggested that malarial infection transiently enhances HIV-1 replication and increases HIV-1 viral load in co-infected individuals2,3. Because this viremia stays high for several weeks after treatment with antimalarials, this phenomenon could have an impact on disease progression and transmission.
The cellular immunological mechanisms behind these observations have been studied only scarcely. The few in vitro studies investigating the impact of malaria on HIV-1 have demonstrated that exposure to soluble malarial antigens can increase HIV-1 infection and reactivation in immune cells. However, these studies used whole cell extracts of P. falciparum schizont stage parasites and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC), making it hard to decipher which malarial component(s) was responsible for the observed effects and what the target host cells were4,5. Recent work has demonstrated that exposure of immature monocyte-derived dendritic cells to the malarial pigment hemozoin increased their ability to transfer HIV-1 to CD4+ T cells6,7, but that it decreased HIV-1 infection of macrophages8. To shed light on this complex process, a systematic analysis of the interactions between the malaria parasite and HIV-1 in different relevant human primary cell populations is critically needed.
Several techniques for investigating the impact of HIV-1 on the phagocytosis of micro-organisms and the effect of such pathogens on HIV-1 replication have been described. We here present a method to investigate the effects of P. falciparum-infected erythrocytes on the replication of HIV-1 in human primary monocyte-derived macrophages. The impact of parasite exposure on HIV-1 transcriptional/translational events is monitored by using single cycle pseudotyped viruses in which a luciferase reporter gene has replaced the Env gene while the effect on the quantity of virus released by the infected macrophages is determined by measuring the HIV-1 capsid protein p24 by ELISA in cell supernatants.

An In vitro Co-infection Model to Study Plasmodium falciparum-HIV-1 Interactions in Human Primary Monocyte-derived Immune Cells

We have developed an in vitro malaria-HIV-1 co-infection model to study the impact of Plasmodium falciparum on the HIV-1 replicative cycle in human primary monocyte-derived macrophages. This versatile system can easily be adapted to other primary cell types susceptible to HIV-1 infection.

Plasmodium falciparum, the causative agent  of the deadliest form of malaria, and human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1) are among the most important ...

New Tools to Expand Regulatory T Cells from HIV-1-infected Individuals

CD4+ Regulatory T cells (Tregs) are potent immune modulators and serve an important function in human immune homeostasis. Depletion of Tregs has led to measurable increases in antigen-specific T cell responses in vaccine settings for cancer and infectious pathogens. However, their role in HIV-1 immuno-pathogenesis remains controversial, as they could either serve to suppress deleterious HIV-1-associated immune activation and thus slow HIV-1 disease progression or alternatively suppress HIV-1-specific immunity and thereby promote virus spread. Understanding and modulating Treg function in the context of HIV-1 could lead to potential new strategies for immunotherapy or HIV vaccines. However, important open questions remain on their role in the context of HIV-1 infection, which needs to be carefully studied.
Representing roughly 5% of human CD4+ T cells in the peripheral blood, studying the Treg population has proven to be difficult, especially in HIV-1 infected individuals where HIV-1-associated CD4 T cell and with that Treg depletion occurs. The characterization of regulatory T cells in individuals with advanced HIV-1 disease or tissue samples, for which only very small biological samples can be obtained, is therefore extremely challenging. We propose a technical solution to overcome these limitations using isolation and expansion of Tregs from HIV-1-positive individuals.
Here we describe an easy and robust method to successfully expand Tregs isolated from HIV-1-infected individuals in vitro. Flow-sorted CD3+CD4+CD25+CD127low Tregs were stimulated with anti-CD3/anti-CD28 coated beads and cultured in the presence of IL-2. The expanded Tregs expressed high levels of FOXP3, CTLA4 and HELIOS compared to conventional T cells and were shown to be highly suppressive. Easier access to large numbers of Tregs will allow researchers to address important questions concerning their role in HIV-1 immunopathogenesis. We believe answering these questions may provide useful insight for the development of an effective HIV-1 vaccine.

CD4+ Regulatory T cells are potent immune-modulators and serve important functions in immune homeostasis. The paucity of these cells in peripheral blood makes functional studies challenging, specifically in the context of HIV-1-infection. We here describe a method to isolate and expand functional CD4+ Tregs from peripheral blood from HIV-1-infected individuals.

CD4+ Regulatory T cells (Tregs) are potent immune modulators and serve an important function in human immune homeostasis. Depletion of Tregs has led to ...

Study of Phagolysosome Biogenesis in Live Macrophages

Phagocytic cells play a major role in the innate immune system by removing and eliminating invading microorganisms in their phagosomes. Phagosome maturation is the complex and tightly regulated process during which a nascent phagosome undergoes drastic transformation through well-orchestrated interactions with various cellular organelles and compartments in the cytoplasm. This process, which is essential for the physiological function of phagocytic cells by endowing phagosomes with their lytic and bactericidal properties, culminates in fusion of phagosomes with lysosomes and biogenesis of phagolysosomes which is considered to be the last and critical stage of maturation for phagosomes. In this report, we describe a live cell imaging based method for qualitative and quantitative analysis of the dynamic process of lysosome to phagosome content delivery, which is a hallmark of phagolysosome biogenesis. This approach uses IgG-coated microbeads as a model for phagocytosis and fluorophore-conjugated dextran molecules as a luminal lysosomal cargo probe, in order to follow the dynamic delivery of lysosmal content to the phagosomes in real time in live macrophages using time-lapse imaging and confocal laser scanning microscopy. Here we describe in detail the background, the preparation steps and the step-by-step experimental setup to enable easy and precise deployment of this method in other labs. Our described method is simple, robust, and most importantly, can be easily adapted to study phagosomal interactions and maturation in different systems and under various experimental settings such as use of various phagocytic cells types, loss-of-function experiments, different probes, and phagocytic particles.

Phagocytic cells play a major role in the innate immune system by removing and eliminating invading microorganisms in their phagosomes. Phagosome ...

Assessing the Innate Sensing of HIV-1 Infected CD4+ T Cells by Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cells Using an Ex vivo Co-culture System.

HIV-1 innate sensing requires direct contact of infected CD4+ T cells with plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs). In order to study this process, the protocols described here use freshly isolated human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) or plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) to sense infections in either T cell line (MT4) or heterologous primary CD4+ T cells. In order to ensure proper sensing, it is essential that PBMC are isolated immediately after blood collection and that optimal percentage of infected T cells are used. Furthermore, multi-parametric flow cytometric staining can be used to confirm that PBMC samples contain the different cell lineages at physiological ratios. A number of controls can also be included to evaluate viability and functionality of pDCs. These include, the presence of specific surface markers, assessing cellular responses to known agonist of Toll-Like Receptors (TLR) pathways, and confirming a lack of spontaneous type-I interferon (IFN) production. In this system, freshly isolated PBMCs or pDCs are co-cultured with HIV-1 infected cells in 96 well plates for 18-22 hr. Supernatants from these co-cultures are then used to determine the levels of bioactive type-I IFNs by monitoring the activation of the ISGF3 pathway in HEK-Blue IFN-&#945;/&#946; cells. Prior and during co-culture conditions, target cells can be subjected to flow cytometric analysis to determine a number of parameters, including the percentage of infected cells, levels of specific surface markers, and differential killing of infected cells. Although, these protocols were initially developed to follow type-I IFN production, they could potentially be used to study other imuno-modulatory molecules released from pDCs and to gain further insight into the molecular mechanisms governing HIV-1 innate sensing.

Assessing the Innate Sensing of HIV-1 Infected CD4+ T Cells by Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cells Using an Ex vivo Co-culture System.

Unlike cell-free HIV-1 particles, infected CD4+ T cells are effectively sensed by plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs). This manuscript describes a method where peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) or isolated pDCs are co-cultured with HIV-1 infected T cells to evaluate innate sensing by pDCs as assessed by release of type-I IFN.

HIV-1 innate sensing requires direct contact of infected CD4+ T cells with plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs). In order to study this process, the ...

Molecular Diffusion in Plasma Membranes of Primary Lymphocytes Measured by Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy

Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is a powerful technique for studying the diffusion of molecules within biological membranes with high spatial and temporal resolution. FCS can quantify the molecular concentration and diffusion coefficient of fluorescently labeled molecules in the cell membrane. This technique has the ability to explore the molecular diffusion characteristics of molecules in the plasma membrane of immune cells in steady state (i.e., without processes affecting the result during the actual measurement time). FCS is suitable for studying the diffusion of proteins that are expressed at levels typical for most endogenous proteins. Here, a straightforward and robust method to determine the diffusion rate of cell membrane proteins on primary lymphocytes is demonstrated. An effective way to perform measurements on antibody-stained live cells and commonly occurring observations after acquisition are described. The recent advancements in the development of photo-stable fluorescent dyes can be utilized by conjugating the antibodies of interest to appropriate dyes that do not bleach extensively during the measurements. Additionally, this allows for the detection of slowly diffusing entities, which is a common feature of proteins expressed in cell membranes. The analysis procedure to extract molecular concentration and diffusion parameters from the generated autocorrelation curves is highlighted. In summary, a basic protocol for FCS measurements is provided; it can be followed by immunologists with an understanding of confocal microscopy but with no other previous experience of techniques for measuring dynamic parameters, such as molecular diffusion rates.

A method to measure protein diffusion in membranes of primary immune cells using fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is described. In this paper, the use of antibodies for fluorescent labeling is illustrated.

Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is a powerful technique for studying the diffusion of molecules within biological membranes with high spatial ...

SILAC Based Proteomic Characterization of Exosomes from HIV-1 Infected Cells

Proteomics is the large-scale analysis of proteins. Proteomic techniques, such as liquid chromatography tandem mass spectroscopy (LC-MS/MS), can characterize thousands of proteins at a time. These powerful techniques allow us to have a systemic understanding of cellular changes, especially when cells are subjected to various stimuli, such as infections, stresses, and specific test conditions. Even with recent developments, analyzing the exosomal proteome is time-consuming and often involves complex methodologies. In addition, the resultant large dataset often needs robust and streamlined analysis in order for researchers to perform further downstream studies. Here, we describe a SILAC-based protocol for characterizing the exosomal proteome when cells are infected with HIV-1. The method is based on simple isotope labeling, isolation of exosomes from differentially labeled cells, and mass spectrometry analysis. This is followed by detailed data mining and bioinformatics analysis of the proteomic hits. The resultant datasets and candidates are easy to understand and often offer a wealth of information that is useful for downstream analysis. This protocol is applicable to other subcellular compartments and a wide range of test conditions.

Here, we describe a quantitative proteomics method using the technique of stable isotope labeling by amino acids in cell culture (SILAC) to analyze the effects of HIV-1 infection on host exosomal proteomes. This protocol can be easily adapted to cells under different stress or infection conditions.