CD4+ T cell subsets present stable relationships in their T cell receptor repertoires

CD4+ T cells are key components of adaptive immunity. The cell differentiation equips CD4+ T cells with new functions. However, the effect of cell differentiation on T cell receptor (TCR) repertoire is not investigated. Here, we examined the features of TCR beta (TCRB) repertoire of the top clones within naïve, memory and regular T cell (Treg) subsets: repertoire structure, gene usage, length distribution and sequence composition. First, we found that memory subsets and Treg would be discriminated from naïve by the features of TCRB repertoire. Second, we found that the correlations between the features of memory subsets and naïve were positively related to differentiation levels of memory subsets. Third, we found that public clones presented a reduced proportion and a skewed sequence composition in differentiated subsets. Furthermore, we found that public clones led naïve to recognize a broader spectrum of antigens than other subsets. Our findings suggest that TCRB repertoire of CD4+ T cell subsets is skewed in a differentiation-depended manner. Our findings show that the variations of public clones contribute to these changes. Our findings indicate that the reduce of public clones in differentiation trim the antigen specificity of CD4+ T cells. The study unveils the physiological effect of memory formation and facilitates the selection of proper CD4+ subset for cellular therapy.