Data from: Stimulation-induced cytokine polyfunctionality as a dynamic concept

Cytokine polyfunctionality is a well-established concept in immune cells,
especially T cells, and their ability to concurrently produce multiple
cytokines has been associated with better immunological disease control
and subsequent effectiveness during infection and disease. To date, only
little is known about the secretion dynamics of those cells, masked by the
widespread deployment of mainly time-integrated endpoint measurement
techniques that do not easily differentiate between concurrent and
sequential secretion. Here, we employed a single-cell microfluidic
platform capable of resolving secretion dynamics of individual PBMCs. To
study the dynamics of poly-cytokine secretion, as well as the dynamics of
concurrent and sequential polyfunctionality, we analyzed the response at
different time points after ex vivo activation. Firstly, we observed
simultaneous secretion of cytokines over the measurement time for most
stimulants in a subpopulation of cells only. Secondly, polyfunctionality
generally decreased with prolonged stimulation times and revealed no
correlation with the concentration of secreted cytokines in response to
stimulation. However, we observed a general trend towards higher cytokine
secretion in polyfunctional cells, with their secretion dynamics being
distinctly different from mono-cytokine secreting cells. This study
provided insights into the distinct secretion behavior of heterogenous
cell populations after stimulation with well-described agents and such a
system could provide better understanding for various immune dynamics in
therapy and disease.