Gut CD4+ T cell phenotypes are a continuum molded by microbes, not by TH archetypes.

Abstract

CD4+ effector lymphocytes (Teff) are traditionally classified by the cytokines they produce. To determine the states that Teff actually adopt in frontline tissues in vivo, we applied single-cell transcriptome and chromatin analysis on colonic Teff cells, in germ-free or conventional mice, or after challenge with a range of phenotypically biasing microbes. Subsets were marked by expression of interferon-signature or myeloid-specific transcripts, but transcriptome or chromatin structure could not resolve discrete clusters fitting classic TH subsets. At baseline or at different times of infection, transcripts encoding cytokines or proteins commonly used as TH markers distributed in a polarized continuum, which was also functionally validated. Clones derived from single progenitors gave rise to both IFN-γ and IL17-producing cells. Most transcriptional variance was tied to the infecting agent, independent of the cytokines produced, and chromatin variance primarily reflected activity of AP1 and IRF transcription factor families, not the canonical subset master regulators T-bet, GATA3, RORγ.