ActSwiftly | Activation and switch of fates in T lymphocytes.

Summary
Antigen-stimulated naïve CD8+ T cells proliferate and differentiate into effector and memory cells. Whereas effector T cells remove infected or cancerous cells, memory T cells protect the organism from re-infections. Despite decades of research, the challenging central questions of how naïve T cells form diverse progeny and what drives the differential response of naïve and memory T cells to infection remain unanswered, largely because of lacking experimental tools.
The goal of this project is to generate a comprehensive model of cell-fate choices of naïve and memory CD8+ T cells in vivo. We will achieve this by addressing three complementary specific objectives:

1) To understand the early and late fate choices in naïve T cells.

2) To uncover differences between naïve and memory T-cell responses and fates.

3) To identify the role of proximal protein kinases LCK and FYN in T-cell fate choices.

We will pursue these aims using a combination of experimental immunology and systems biology. We used the synergy between novel genetic models and single cell atlases (i) to characterize an unprecedented transient stage of activated T cells, (ii) to determine the early gene expression signatures and fate choices of in vivo activated naïve and memory T cells, and (iii) to observe that LCK secures memory T-cell formation. These tools and findings offer us novel perspectives to tackle the challenging objective in its full complexity. We will develop additional unique experimental models coupled with innovative in-silico techniques to uncover the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying diverse fate choices of particular T-cell subsets and to narrow the gap between mouse and human immunology.
Overall, this project has the ambition to resolve long-standing fundamental questions in immunology to open new avenues for targeting and modulating T-cell fates in vivo for efficient vaccine design and for promoting beneficial cytotoxic responses to chronic infections and cancer.
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More information & hyperlinks
Web resources: https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101125695
Start date: 01-01-2025
End date: 31-12-2029
Total budget - Public funding: 2 625 000,00 Euro - 2 625 000,00 Euro
Cordis data

Original description

Antigen-stimulated naïve CD8+ T cells proliferate and differentiate into effector and memory cells. Whereas effector T cells remove infected or cancerous cells, memory T cells protect the organism from re-infections. Despite decades of research, the challenging central questions of how naïve T cells form diverse progeny and what drives the differential response of naïve and memory T cells to infection remain unanswered, largely because of lacking experimental tools.
The goal of this project is to generate a comprehensive model of cell-fate choices of naïve and memory CD8+ T cells in vivo. We will achieve this by addressing three complementary specific objectives:

1) To understand the early and late fate choices in naïve T cells.

2) To uncover differences between naïve and memory T-cell responses and fates.

3) To identify the role of proximal protein kinases LCK and FYN in T-cell fate choices.

We will pursue these aims using a combination of experimental immunology and systems biology. We used the synergy between novel genetic models and single cell atlases (i) to characterize an unprecedented transient stage of activated T cells, (ii) to determine the early gene expression signatures and fate choices of in vivo activated naïve and memory T cells, and (iii) to observe that LCK secures memory T-cell formation. These tools and findings offer us novel perspectives to tackle the challenging objective in its full complexity. We will develop additional unique experimental models coupled with innovative in-silico techniques to uncover the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying diverse fate choices of particular T-cell subsets and to narrow the gap between mouse and human immunology.
Overall, this project has the ambition to resolve long-standing fundamental questions in immunology to open new avenues for targeting and modulating T-cell fates in vivo for efficient vaccine design and for promoting beneficial cytotoxic responses to chronic infections and cancer.

Status

SIGNED

Call topic

ERC-2023-COG

Update Date

20-11-2024
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Horizon Europe
HORIZON.1 Excellent Science
HORIZON.1.1 European Research Council (ERC)
HORIZON.1.1.0 Cross-cutting call topics
ERC-2023-COG ERC CONSOLIDATOR GRANTS
HORIZON.1.1.1 Frontier science
ERC-2023-COG ERC CONSOLIDATOR GRANTS