Sara van den Berg

101 4 CMV on influenza infection Figure 4. No sign of increased inflammation in CMV+ individuals based on cytokines levels in serum nor in relation to the influenza-specific T-cell response. A) Serum levels of “inflammaging markers” CRP and IL-6 upon influenza infection for CMV+ and CMV- individuals at <72 hours after fever onset, and 2 and 8 weeks later. B) The IFN γ :IL-10 ratio was calculated for CMV- and CMV-individuals upon influenza infection. C) Magnitude of the influenza virus-specific IFN γ response at <72 hours upon infection with influenza virus are not associated with the level of CRP, IL-6, IFN γ or IL-10 in serum. Serum levels of the cytokines were measured by multiplex assays and normalized based on subtracting the mean per plate. Differences were tested using unpaired T-test to compare CMV- and CMV+ individuals. Influenza-specific T-cell responses were measured by ELISPOT for IFN γ spots to overlapping influenza matrix-protein 1 peptide pools. Correlations between influenza-specific IFN γ response and the different cytokines levels in serum were assessed by Spearman correlation. T-cell IFN γ responses are presented per 1x10 6 PBMCs.