Multimodal profiling of 500,000 memory T cells from a tuberculosis cohort identifies cell state associations with demographics, environment, and disease

We conducted CITE-seq to measure whole transcriptome gene expression and surface expression of 31 proteins. We assayed >500K memory T cells from 259 donors from a tuberculosis progression cohort (128 cases: former progressors and 131 controls: non-progresssors/latent infection) >4 years post-infection after returning to immune steady state. We defined 31 memory T cell states influenced by age, sex, genetic ancestry, and season. After correcting for these covariates, we found that one cell state (C-12), resembling the T helper cells Th17s, were depleted in cases compared to controls. When sorted ex vivo, this state responds to polyclonal or Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) peptide antigen stimulation with interleukin-17 (IL-17) or interferon gamma (IFNg).