Memory CD8⁺ T cell responses expand when antigen presentation overcomes T cell self-regulation

Antimicrobial memory CD8⁺ T cell responses are not readily expanded by either repeated infections or immunizations. This is a major obstacle to the development of T cell vaccines. Prime-boost immunization with heterologous microbes sharing the same CD8⁺ epitope can induce a large expansion of the CD8⁺ response; however, different vectors vary greatly in their ability to boost for reasons that are poorly understood. To investigate how efficient memory T cell expansion can occur, we evaluated immune regulatory events and Ag presentation after secondary immunization with strong and weak boosting vectors. We found that dendritic cells were essential for T cell boosting and that Ag presentation by these cells was regulated by cognate memory CD8⁺ T cells. When weak boosting vectors were used for secondary immunization, pre-established CD8⁺ T cells were able to effectively curtail Ag presentation, resulting in limited CD8⁺ T cell expansion. In contrast, a strong boosting vector, vaccinia virus, induced highly efficient Ag presentation that overcame regulation by cognate T cells and induced large numbers of memory CD8⁺ T cells to expand. Thus, efficient targeting of Ag to dendritic cells in the face of cognate immunity is an important requirement for T cell expansion.