Accumulation of CD161⁻ Vα7.2⁺ T cells in the peripheral blood of chronically HIV-infected patients. (A) Identification and frequency of CD161⁻ Vα7.2⁺ T cells in 34 HIV-1–uninfected and 33 untreated HIV-infected individuals. The frequency of total Vα7.2⁺ T cells is shown in subpanel iii. (B) Peripheral blood MAIT cells that were defined as IL-18R⁺ Vα7.2⁺ T cells (Bi left), and the proportion of IL-18R⁺ Vα7.2⁺ MAIT cells that did not express CD161 (Bi right) was determined in HIV-1 uninfected and HIV-1 infected individuals (iii). The frequency of CD161⁻ IL-18R⁺ Vα7.2⁺ MAIT cells as a percentage of CD3⁺ T cells is shown in subpanel iv. The relationship between proportion of IL-18R⁺ Vα7.2⁺ MAIT cells that did not express CD161 and time since HIV diagnosis was assessed using Spearman rank correlation (v). (C) The frequency of Vβ2/Vβ13.1/Vβ13.2/Vβ13.6⁺ CD161⁺ Vα7.2⁺ MAIT cells and CD161⁻ Vα7.2⁺ T cells in 13 uninfected controls and 12 HIV-infected patients (i-ii). The CD4 and CD8 distribution of CD161⁻ Vα7.2⁺ T cells in a representative uninfected control, a viremic, and an elite controller HIV-infected patient (iii). (D) A representative figure of the transcription factor PLZF expression in CD161⁺ Vα7.2⁺ MAIT (Di left) and CD161⁻ Vα7.2⁺ T cells (Di right). Black lines denote uninfected control and gray lines untreated HIV-infected patient. Light gray lines denote FMO controls. The PLZF mean fluorescence intensity (MFI) from 12 uninfected controls and 19 HIV-infected patients is shown in subpanel ii. Box and whisker plots show median, IQR and the 10th to 90th percentile. VL indicates viral load; and Tx, therapy.