Peripheral blood lymphocyte adhesion molecule deployment in the immune response.

Using precise and reproducible flow cytometric measurements, the surface densities of the cell adhesion molecules (CAMs) CD29, CD2 and CD11a were studied on the CAMhigh (primed) subsets of peripheral blood CD4+ and CD8+ lymphocytes in 56 healthy subjects; 18 patients with acute bacterial infections, 19 with acute viral infections and 18 with chronic inflammatory conditions. By Mann–Whitney analysis, with significant P values adjusted for multiple comparisons to control mean + 3 SD in 12 (22%) patients. By multiple regression analysis CD11a density on CD8+ and CD4+ cells and CD2 density on CD4+ cells were found to be associated with HLA-DR expression, but not with CD25 expression. Using standardized intercepts the authors demonstrated that there are very few circulating CD11ahighCD25+ cells, suggesting that these are rapidly extravasated. This study demonstrates that in disease, lymphocyte adhesion molecules are not deployed in concert and there are characteristic deployment patterns for different types of immune response.