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Hepatitis C virus dendritic cell-based immunotherapy: Investigati | 20921
Journal of Cell Science & Therapy

Journal of Cell Science & Therapy
Open Access

ISSN: 2157-7013

+44 1300 500008

Hepatitis C virus dendritic cell-based immunotherapy: Investigation of the Immunomodulatory effect of Berberis vulgaris on core-pulsed dendritic cell vaccine


2nd World Congress on Cell Science & Stem Cell Research

November 12-14, 2012 Hilton San Antonio Airport, USA

Eiman Hassan Elwakeel

Posters: J Cell Sci Ther

Abstract :

V irus-induced dendritic cells (DCs) functional deficiency leads to sub-optimal initiation of adaptive immune responses and finally to chronic infection establishment. Because vaccination strategies to induce strong T-cell responses against hepatitis C virus are of great importance, we propose an advanced HCV vaccine based on in vivo enriching DCs with Berberis vulgaris ethanolic crude extract (BEC), then immunizing mice with these enriched DCs after pulsing them with HCV core protein. DCs were enriched by BEC intravenous injection in BALB/c mice. Enriched splenic CD11c+ populations were ex vivo pulsed with HCV core protein, then subcutaneously injected into another BALB/c model for immunization. Vaccine efficiency was assessed by flow cytometric analysis of splenocytes of immunized mice, cytokine profiling, cytotoxic T-lymphocyte assay, and humoral immune response assessment. Results showed that BEC raised CD11c+ population by 16.3% when compared to negative control. Relative to mice injected with RPMI-1640 medium, there was no significant difference in surface phenotypic characterization of splenocytes from mice immunized with non-BEC-enriched-core-pulsed DCs. However, splenocytes from mice immunized with BEC-enriched-core-pulsed DCs showed 197% increase in CD16+ population, 33% increase in MHCII+ population, and 43% decrease in CD3+ population. Also 57.9% greater anti-core cytotoxic T lymphocyte activity and up-regulation in interferon gamma and interleukin (IL) -12 expressions, while down-regulation in IL-4 and IL-10 were detected at the same group. Moreover, sustained specific anti-core antibodies were detected only in sera of the same group. In conclusion, our results indicate that BEC- enriched-core-transduced DCs may serve as a new model for immunotherapy of HCV chronic infection

Biography :

Eiman Hassan Elwakeel is a M.Sc. student at Faculty of Science, Alexandria University. She is a clinical analyst and an assistant researcher at a project about Hepatitis C virus immunotherapy under supervision of Ass. Prof. Doaa Ahmad Ghareeb, at Biochemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Alexandria University

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