Funding outcome

Sexual status such as male or female impacts immune cell functions but has been neglected for too long in the medical field. It has become clear that sex influences our immune system and subsequently results in sex-specific outcomes from infectious diseases, autoimmune diseases, malignancies and even response to vaccines. Recently, for the very first time, we discovered that immature red blood cells are abundant in newborns and weaken their immune cell activities. Here based on our preliminary observations, we propose that immature red blood cells are present in high numbers in the blood of females but not males. In addition, we observed that pregnant women have a significant number of immature red blood cells in their blood. Since these immature red blood cells are functionally immunosuppressive, we believe their expansion in females might impact their immune system. In addition, we see the expansion of these cells in female HIV patients but not males. Therefore, we believe the abundance of these immature red blood cells in HIV patients may increase HIV replication and make HIV infected individuals sicker. We propose this might be a reason for why women progress to AIDS faster than men. In this proposal, we are interested in studying the role of immature red blood cells in more depth in females. We will be measuring the levels of these cells in the blood of healthy young females versus males. In addition, we will measure the percentages of these cells and their function in different stages of pregnancy as our preliminary observation shows these cells are expanded in pregnant women and possibly are beneficial during pregnancy. Since these cells are abundant in HIV patients, we will also investigate whether these immature red blood cells are suppressing the killer T cell function in HIV patients. We believe this study provides some insight into the role of these newly identified cells in females especially during pregnancy and in the context of HIV infection. Thus, this study highlights the importance of sex and will assist us to take account of sex differences in future medical/health interventions.