Quantifying Distribution of Flow Cytometric TCR-Vβ Usage with Economic Statistics

Kornelis S M van der Geest; Wayel H Abdulahad; Gerda Horst; Pedro G Lorencetti; Johan Bijzet; Suzanne Arends; Marieke van der Heiden; Anne-Marie Buisman; Bart-Jan Kroesen; Elisabeth Brouwer; Annemieke M H Boots

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0125373

Quantifying Distribution of Flow Cytometric TCR-Vβ Usage with Economic Statistics

PLoS One. 2015 Apr 29;10(4):e0125373. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0125373. eCollection 2015.

Affiliations

¹ Department of Rheumatology and Clinical Immunology, University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
² Department of Rheumatology and Clinical Immunology, University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands; Center for Immunology of Infectious Diseases and Vaccines, National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, Bilthoven, The Netherlands.
³ Center for Immunology of Infectious Diseases and Vaccines, National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, Bilthoven, The Netherlands.
⁴ Department Laboratory Medicine, University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.

Abstract

Measuring changes of the T cell receptor (TCR) repertoire is important to many fields of medicine. Flow cytometry is a popular technique to study the TCR repertoire, as it quickly provides insight into the TCR-Vβ usage among well-defined populations of T cells. However, the interpretation of the flow cytometric data remains difficult, and subtle TCR repertoire changes may go undetected. Here, we introduce a novel means for analyzing the flow cytometric data on TCR-Vβ usage. By applying economic statistics, we calculated the Gini-TCR skewing index from the flow cytometric TCR-Vβ analysis. The Gini-TCR skewing index, which is a direct measure of TCR-Vβ distribution among T cells, allowed us to track subtle changes of the TCR repertoire among distinct populations of T cells. Application of the Gini-TCR skewing index to the flow cytometric TCR-Vβ analysis will greatly help to gain better understanding of the TCR repertoire in health and disease.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

CD4-Positive T-Lymphocytes / immunology
CD8-Positive T-Lymphocytes / immunology
Cell Differentiation / immunology*
Flow Cytometry / statistics & numerical data*
Humans
Immunization
Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta / immunology*
Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta / isolation & purification
T-Lymphocytes, Cytotoxic / immunology*
T-Lymphocytes, Helper-Inducer / immunology
Vaccination

Substances

Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell, alpha-beta

Grants and funding

This study was supported by unrestricted grants from NV Organon (now MSD) to AMHB, Foundation 'De Drie Lichten' (project no. 19/11 GJF/mk) to KvdG, Foundation 'Jan Kornelis de Cock' to KvdG (project no. 2012-22), and by strategic research funding of the National Institute of Public Health (SOR230426/01) to A-MB. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.