Tracking T-cell immune reconstitution after TCRαβ/CD19-depleted hematopoietic cells transplantation in children

alpha beta T-cell-depleted allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation holds promise for the safe and accessible therapy of both malignant and non-malignant blood disorders. Here we employed molecular barcoding normalized T-cell receptor (TCR) profiling to quantitatively track T-cell immune reconstitution after TCR alpha beta-/CD19-depleted transplantation in children. We demonstrate that seemingly early reconstitution of alpha beta T-cell counts 2 months after transplantation is based on only several hundred rapidly expanded clones originating from non-depleted graft cells. In further months, frequency of these hyperexpanded clones declines, and after 1 year the observed T-cell counts and TCR beta diversity are mostly provided by the newly produced T cells. We also demonstrate that high TCR beta diversity at day 60 observed for some of the patients is determined by recipient T cells and intrathymic progenitors that survived conditioning regimen. Our results indicate that further efforts on optimization of TCR alpha beta-/CD19-depleted transplantation protocols should be directed toward providing more efficient T-cell defense in the first months after transplantation.