Browsing by Author "Kappes, John C"

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Open Access
Differential inhibition of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 in peripheral blood mononuclear cells and TZM-bl cells by endotoxin-mediated chemokine and gamma interferon production.
(AIDS Res Hum Retroviruses, 2010-03) Geonnotti, Anthony R; Bilska, Miroslawa; Yuan, Xing; Ochsenbauer, Christina; Edmonds, Tara G; Kappes, John C; Liao, Hua-Xin; Haynes, Barton F; Montefiori, David C
Bacterial lipopolysaccharide (endotoxin) is a frequent contaminant of biological specimens and is also known to be a potent inducer of beta-chemokines and other soluble factors that inhibit HIV-1 infection in vitro. Though lipopolysaccharide (LPS) has been shown to stimulate the production of soluble HIV-1 inhibitors in cultures of monocyte-derived macrophages, the ability of LPS to induce similar inhibitors in other cell types is poorly characterized. Here we show that LPS exhibits potent anti-HIV activity in phytohemagglutinin-stimulated peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) but has no detectable anti-HIV-1 activity in TZM-bl cells. The anti-HIV-1 activity of LPS in PBMCs was strongly associated with the production of beta-chemokines from CD14-positive monocytes. Culture supernatants from LPS-stimulated PBMCs exhibited potent anti-HIV-1 activity when added to TZM-bl cells but, in this case, the antiviral activity appeared to be related to IFN-gamma rather than to beta-chemokines. These observations indicate that LPS stimulates PBMCs to produce a complex array of soluble HIV-1 inhibitors, including beta-chemokines and IFN-gamma, that differentially inhibit HIV-1 depending on the target cell type. The results also highlight the need to use endotoxin-free specimens to avoid artifacts when assessing HIV-1-specific neutralizing antibodies in PBMC-based assays.
Open Access
Infectious virion capture by HIV-1 gp120-specific IgG from RV144 vaccinees.
(J Virol, 2013-07) Liu, Pinghuang; Yates, Nicole L; Shen, Xiaoying; Bonsignori, Mattia; Moody, M Anthony; Liao, Hua-Xin; Fong, Youyi; Alam, S Munir; Overman, R Glenn; Denny, Thomas; Ferrari, Guido; Ochsenbauer, Christina; Kappes, John C; Polonis, Victoria R; Pitisuttithum, Punnee; Kaewkungwal, Jaranit; Nitayaphan, Sorachai; Rerks-Ngarm, Supachai; Montefiori, David C; Gilbert, Peter; Michael, Nelson L; Kim, Jerome H; Haynes, Barton F; Tomaras, Georgia D
The detailed examination of the antibody repertoire from RV144 provides a unique template for understanding potentially protective antibody functions. Some potential immune correlates of protection were untested in the correlates analyses due to inherent assay limitations, as well as the need to keep the correlates analysis focused on a limited number of endpoints to achieve statistical power. In an RV144 pilot study, we determined that RV144 vaccination elicited antibodies that could bind infectious virions (including the vaccine strains HIV-1 CM244 and HIV-1 MN and an HIV-1 strain expressing transmitted/founder Env, B.WITO.c). Among vaccinees with the highest IgG binding antibody profile, the majority (78%) captured the infectious vaccine strain virus (CM244), while a smaller proportion of vaccinees (26%) captured HIV-1 transmitted/founder Env virus. We demonstrated that vaccine-elicited HIV-1 gp120 antibodies of multiple specificities (V3, V2, conformational C1, and gp120 conformational) mediated capture of infectious virions. Although capture of infectious HIV-1 correlated with other humoral immune responses, the extent of variation between these humoral responses and virion capture indicates that virion capture antibodies occupy unique immunological space.
Open Access
Optimization and validation of a neutralizing antibody assay for HIV-1 in A3R5 cells.
(Journal of immunological methods, 2014-07) Sarzotti-Kelsoe, Marcella; Daniell, Xiaoju; Todd, Christopher A; Bilska, Miroslawa; Martelli, Amanda; LaBranche, Celia; Perez, Lautaro G; Ochsenbauer, Christina; Kappes, John C; Rountree, Wes; Denny, Thomas N; Montefiori, David C
A3R5 is a human CD4(+) lymphoblastoid cell line that was engineered to express CCR5 and is useful for the detection of weak neutralizing antibody responses against tier 2 strains of HIV-1. Here we describe the optimization and validation of the HIV-1 neutralizing antibody assay that utilizes A3R5 cells, performed in compliance with Good Clinical Laboratory Practice (GCLP) guidelines. The assay utilizes Renilla luciferase-expressing replication competent infectious molecular clones (IMC) encoding heterologous env genes from different HIV-1 clades. Key assay validation parameters tested included specificity, accuracy, precision, limit of detection and quantitation, specificity, linearity and range, and robustness. Plasma samples demonstrated higher non-specific activity than serum samples in the A3R5 assay. This assay can tolerate a wide range of virus input but is more sensitive to cell concentration. The higher sensitivity of the A3R5 assay in neutralization responses to tier 2 strains of HIV-1 makes it complementary to, but not a substitute for the TZM-bl assay. The validated A3R5 assay is employed as an endpoint immunogenicity test for vaccine-elicited neutralizing antibodies against tier 2 strains of HIV-1, and to identify correlates of protection in HIV-1 vaccine trials conducted globally.
Open Access
Phenotypic properties of transmitted founder HIV-1.
(Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 2013-04-23) Parrish, Nicholas F; Gao, Feng; Li, Hui; Giorgi, Elena E; Barbian, Hannah J; Parrish, Erica H; Zajic, Lara; Iyer, Shilpa S; Decker, Julie M; Kumar, Amit; Hora, Bhavna; Berg, Anna; Cai, Fangping; Hopper, Jennifer; Denny, Thomas N; Ding, Haitao; Ochsenbauer, Christina; Kappes, John C; Galimidi, Rachel P; West, Anthony P; Bjorkman, Pamela J; Wilen, Craig B; Doms, Robert W; O'Brien, Meagan; Bhardwaj, Nina; Borrow, Persephone; Haynes, Barton F; Muldoon, Mark; Theiler, James P; Korber, Bette; Shaw, George M; Hahn, Beatrice H
Defining the virus-host interactions responsible for HIV-1 transmission, including the phenotypic requirements of viruses capable of establishing de novo infections, could be important for AIDS vaccine development. Previous analyses have failed to identify phenotypic properties other than chemokine receptor 5 (CCR5) and CD4+ T-cell tropism that are preferentially associated with viral transmission. However, most of these studies were limited to examining envelope (Env) function in the context of pseudoviruses. Here, we generated infectious molecular clones of transmitted founder (TF; n = 27) and chronic control (CC; n = 14) viruses of subtypes B (n = 18) and C (n = 23) and compared their phenotypic properties in assays specifically designed to probe the earliest stages of HIV-1 infection. We found that TF virions were 1.7-fold more infectious (P = 0.049) and contained 1.9-fold more Env per particle (P = 0.048) compared with CC viruses. TF viruses were also captured by monocyte-derived dendritic cells 1.7-fold more efficiently (P = 0.035) and more readily transferred to CD4+ T cells (P = 0.025). In primary CD4+ T cells, TF and CC viruses replicated with comparable kinetics; however, when propagated in the presence of IFN-α, TF viruses replicated to higher titers than CC viruses. This difference was significant for subtype B (P = 0.000013) but not subtype C (P = 0.53) viruses, possibly reflecting demographic differences of the respective patient cohorts. Together, these data indicate that TF viruses are enriched for higher Env content, enhanced cell-free infectivity, improved dendritic cell interaction, and relative IFN-α resistance. These viral properties, which likely act in concert, should be considered in the development and testing of AIDS vaccines.