Cytotoxic activity and gene expression during in vitro adaptive cell-mediated cytotoxicity of head-kidney cells from betanodavirus-infected European sea bass

García-Álvarez, Miguel Ángel; Chaves-Pozo, Elena; Cuesta, Alberto; Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación; Agencia Estatal de Investigación; Chaves-Pozo, Elena [0000-0003-4030-1273]; Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas [https://ror.org/02gfc7t72]

Cytotoxic activity and gene expression during in vitro adaptive cell-mediated cytotoxicity of head-kidney cells from betanodavirus-infected European sea bass

2024

Cell-mediated cytotoxicity (CMC) is essential in eradicating virus-infected cells, involving CD8+ T lymphocytes (CTLs) and natural killer (NK) cells, through the activation of different pathways. This immune response is well-studied in mammals but scarcely in teleost fish. Our aim was to investigate the adaptive CMC using head-kidney (HK) cells from European sea bass infected at different times with nodavirus (NNV), as effector cells, and the European sea bass brain cell line (DLB-1) infected with different NNV genotypes, as target cells. Results showed low and unaltered innate cytotoxic activity through the infection time. However, adaptive CMC against RGNNV and SJNNV/RGNNV-infected target cells increased from 7 to 30 days post-infection, peaking at 15 days, demonstrating the specificity of the cytotoxic activity and suggesting the involvement of CTLs. At transcriptomic level, we observed up-regulation of genes related to T cell activation, perforin/granzyme and Fas/FasL effector pathways as well as apoptotic cell death. Further studies are necessary to understand the adaptive role of European sea bass CTLs in the elimination of NNV-infected cells.

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This work was funded by Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación-Agencia Estatal de Investigación (MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033, grant PID2019-105522 GB-I00 to A.C. and grant PID2021-122287OB-C22 to E.C-P.).

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Peer reviewed

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