Wu, YuntaoYoder, AlysonYu, DongyangWang, WeifengLiu, JuanBarrett, TraceyWheeler, DavidSchlauch, Karen2012-01-112012-01-1120082008-10-17Wu, Yuntao, Alyson Yoder, Dongyang Yu, Weifeng Wang, Juan Liu, Tracey Barrett, David Wheeler, Karen Schlauch. "Cofilin activation in peripheral CD4 T cells of HIV-1 infected patients: a pilot study" Retrovirology 5:95. (2008)1742-4690https://hdl.handle.net/2144/3302Cofilin is an actin-depolymerizing factor that regulates actin dynamics critical for T cell migration and T cell activation. In unstimulated resting CD4 T cells, cofilin exists largely as a phosphorylated inactive form. Previously, we demonstrated that during HIV-1 infection of resting CD4 T cells, the viral envelope-CXCR4 signaling activates cofilin to overcome the static cortical actin restriction. In this pilot study, we have extended this in vitro observation and examined cofilin phosphorylation in resting CD4 T cells purified from the peripheral blood of HIV-1-infected patients. Here, we report that the resting T cells from infected patients carry significantly higher levels of active cofilin, suggesting that these resting cells have been primed in vivo in cofilin activity to facilitate HIV-1 infection. HIV-1-mediated aberrant activation of cofilin may also lead to abnormalities in T cell migration and activation that could contribute to viral pathogenesis.enCopyright 2008 Wu et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0Article10.1186/1742-4690-5-95189285532576353