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Cytokine response following perturbation of the cervicovaginal milieu during HPV genital infection

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Abstract

Human papillomaviruses (HPVs) are oncogenic viruses causing most cervical cancers. Highly prevalent in young, sexually active women, only a minority of HPV infections persist. To better characterize the immuno-modulatory impact of early HPV infections, we measured changes in a panel of 20 cytokines in cervicovaginal samples collected from young women who were tested for HPV and self-reported for genital inflammation and infection symptoms. Multi-factor statistical analyses revealed that increased IL-1Alpha and IL-12/IL-23p40 concentrations were associated with HPV infection and that macrophage inflammatory proteins were associated in particular with high-risk HPV infections. ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT02946346

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Data availability

The data will be deposited at the Zenodo repository. https://zenodo.org/record/4701172.

Code availability

The R code for the statistical analysis will be deposited at the Zenodo repository.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the IRD itrop HPC (South Green Platform) at IRD Montpellier for providing HPC resources that have contributed to the research results reported within this paper (URL: http://www.southgreen.fr).

We also acknowledge productive feedback on the manuscript by Nicolas Tessandier.

Funding

This work was supported by the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program [grant agreement No 648963 to SA]. The sponsor had no role in study design, in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data, in the writing of the report, and in the decision to submit the article for publication.

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Author notes

  1. Christian Selinger and Massilva Rahmoun contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratoire MIVEGEC (UMR CNRS 5290, IRD 224, UM), Montpellier, France

    Christian Selinger, Massilva Rahmoun, Carmen Lia Murall, Claire Bernat, Vanina Boué, Sophie Grasset, Soraya Groc & Samuel Alizon

  2. Institut de Recherche Pour Le Développement, 911 Avenue Agropolis, BP 64501, 34394, Montpellier cedex 5, France

    Christian Selinger

  3. Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Montpellier, University of Montpellier, Montpellier, France

    Marine Bonneau & Christelle Graf

  4. Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Montpellier, Montpellier, France

    Jacques Reynes

  5. IRMB-PPC, INM, Univ Montpellier, CHU Montpellier, INSERM CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Christophe Hirtz

  6. Laboratory of Cellular and Molecular Immunology, GIGA Research, University of Liège, 4000, Liège, Belgium

    Nathalie Jacobs

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  1. Christian Selinger
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  2. Massilva Rahmoun
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Contributions

Conceived or designed the study: SA, CLM, CH, NJ, and JR.

Wrote the paper: SA, CS, MR, CLM, and NJ.

Performed research: MR, CB, VB, Soraya G, SG, CG, and MB.

Contributed new methods or models: CS and MR.

Analyzed data: CS.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Christian Selinger.

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Selinger, C., Rahmoun, M., Murall, C.L. et al. Cytokine response following perturbation of the cervicovaginal milieu during HPV genital infection. Immunol Res 69, 255–263 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12026-021-09196-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12026-021-09196-2

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