Functional biomarker signatures of circulating T-cells and its association with distinct clinical status of leprosy patients and their respective household contacts

Table 1 Cytokine profile amongst peripheral blood mononuclear cells from leprosy patients, household contacts and healthy controls upon in vitro culture

Parameters	Groups		Subgroups
	Healthy Controls	Leprosy	HHC		Leprosy
	Healthy Controls	Leprosy	HHC(PB)	HHC(MB)	L(PB)	L(MB)
Mycobacterium leprae-stimulated /Non-stimulated Culture INDEX*
T-cells
IFN-γ⁺	1.4 ± 0.2	1.1 ± 0.2	1.3 ± 0.2	1.3 ± 0.4	1.3 ± 0.2	0.8 ± 0.2
IL-4⁺	1.3 ± 0.2	1.0 ± 0.2	1.6 ± 0.6	0.8 ± 0.1	1.0 ± 0.2	1.0 ± 0.2
IL-10⁺	2.3 ± 0.7	2.3 ± 0.8	2.1 ± 0.7	3.6 ± 2.0	2.2 ± 0.9	2.5 ± 1.6
CD4⁺T-cells
IFN-γ⁺	1.3 ± 0.2	1.0 ± 0.2	1.3 ± 0.3	1.5 ± 0.3	1.1 ± 0.2	0.9 ± 0.3
IL-4⁺	0.8 ± 0.1	1.2 ± 0.3	0.7 ± 0.1	0.7 ± 0.1	0.9 ± 0.2	1.4 ± 0.5
IL-10⁺	1.1 ± 0.2	1.5 ± 0.5	1.1 ± 0.2	1.1 ± 0.3	1.2 ± 0.2	1.9 ± 1.4
CD8⁺T-cells
IFN-γ⁺	1.2 ± 0.2	0.9 ± 0.2	1.0 ± 0.2	1.2 ± 0.4	1.3 ± 0.1	0.8 ± 0.2
IL-4⁺	0.8 ± 0.1	0.7 ± 0.1	0.8 ± 0.0	1.0 ± 0.2	0.6 ± 0.1	0.8 ± 0.2
IL-10⁺	1.1 ± 0.2	1.1 ± 0.1	1.1 ± 0.1	0.9 ± 0.2	1.2 ± 0.1	0.8 ± 0.1^e

HHC(PB) household contacts of paucibacillary leprosy patients, HHC(MB) household contacts of multibacillary leprosy patients, L(PB) paucibacillary leprosy patients, L(MB) multibacillary leprosy patients
*Data are expressed as mean INDEX (‰) ± standard error of cytokine⁺ cells (IFN-γ, IL-4 and IL-10) amongst gated lymphocyte subsets upon in vitro culture in the presence/absence of M. leprae antigen, including: T-cells, CD4⁺ T-cells and CD8⁺ T-cells. Multiple comparisons amongst groups were carried out by ANOVA test followed by Tuckey post-test for sequential pairwise comparisons. Additionally, Student t test were also employed for pairwise comparative analysis. Significant differences at P < 0.05, using the above-mentioned statistical methods is underscored by the letter “e” for comparison with L(PB)

ISSN: 2049-9957