Single-cell RNA-seq analysis of human KIR+ CD8 T cells by Smart-seq2

KIR+ CD8 T cells (Live CD3+CD56-TCRab+CD8+KIR+ cells) were sorted from the blood of healthy subjects (N=10) and patients with MS (N=2), SLE (N=6), or CeD (N=5) and subjected to single-cell RNA-seq analysis by Smart-seq2. In parallel, we also analyzed their T-cell receptor (TCR) α and β sequences. Unsupervised clustering of these KIR+CD8+ T cells by Seurat identified six clusters, with Clusters 1 to 3 mostly containing expanded KIR+CD8+ T cells (≥2 cells expressing same TCR) and Clusters 5 and 6 consisting of unexpanded cells expressing unique TCRs. There are common features shared by KIR+CD8+ T cells from healthy subjects and different diseases, yet there is also heterogeneity (i.e., upregulated type I IFN signaling and glycolysis in Clusters 2 and 3) associated with different diseases or treatments. KIR+ CD8 T cells were sorted from healthy subjects (N=10) and patients with MS (N=2), SLE (N=6), or CeD (N=5) and subjected to single-cell RNA-seq analysis by Smart-seq2.