PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Yee Mon, Kristel Joy
AU  - Goldsmith, Elizabeth
AU  - Watson, Neva B.
AU  - Wang, Jocelyn
AU  - Smith, Norah L.
AU  - Rudd, Brian D.
TI  - Differential Sensitivity to IL-12 Drives Sex-Specific Differences in the CD8<sup>+</sup> T Cell Response to Infection
AID  - 10.4049/immunohorizons.1800066
DP  - 2019 Apr 01
TA  - ImmunoHorizons
PG  - 121--132
VI  - 3
IP  - 4
4099  - http://www.immunohorizons.org/content/3/4/121.short
4100  - http://www.immunohorizons.org/content/3/4/121.full
AB  - It is well known that males and females respond differently to intracellular pathogens. Females mount a more robust immune response than males, which decreases their susceptibility to infection but comes at the cost of increasing immunopathology. However, the underlying basis for sex-specific differences in the CD8+ T cell response to infection remains poorly understood. In this study, we show that female CD8+ T cells have an intrinsic propensity to become short-lived effectors, whereas male CD8+ T cells give rise to more memory precursor effector cells after murine infection with either a virus (vaccinia virus) or bacteria (Listeria monocytogenes). Interestingly, we found that the propensity of female CD8+ T cells to form short-lived effectors is not because they respond to lower amounts of cognate Ag but rather because they have an enhanced capacity to respond to IL-12, which facilitates more effector cell differentiation at each round of cell division. Our findings provide key insights into the sex-based immunological differences that underlie variations in the susceptibility to infection in males and females.