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Germinal Center T follicular helper (GC-Tfh) cell impairment in chronic HIV infection involves c-Maf signaling

Fig 2

Multi-dimensional Scaling Plot (MDS) reveals unique proliferation- and infection-related gene profile clustering in GC-Tfh cells from HIV^pos versus HIV^neg individuals.

We performed single-gene analysis of divided/activated versus non-proliferating LN GC-Tfh cells after 5 days of co-culture with autologous GC-B cells from HIV^pos patients versus healthy subjects. Principle component (PC) analysis shown in the MDS plot along the first and second principle components, provides a visual representation of the similarity or distance between datasets from all samples. GC-Tfh cells were analyzed based on whether they are proliferating (CFSE negative CFSE^neg: pink data points) or non-proliferating (CFSE positive CFSE^pos: green data points), but also based on infection status (HIV negative HIV^neg: circles or HIV positive HIV^pos: triangles). MDS plot shows gene expression clustering between proliferating versus non-proliferating GC-Tfh cells as well as between proliferating HIV^pos versus HIV^neg GC-Tfh cells. Each symbol represents one sample. CFSE^neg HIV^neg: n = 4; CFSE^neg HIV^pos: n = 6; CFSE^pos HIV^neg: n = 3; CFSE^pos HIV^pos: n = 5).

doi: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.ppat.1009732.g002