Figure 4

Restricted access of CD4⁺CD28^null T-cells subset to synovial fluid. (a) TCR-Vβ repertoire of CD4⁺CD28^null T cells (left) and CD4⁺CD28⁺ T cells (right) from peripheral blood (PB, filled bars) and synovial fluid (SF, open bars) from one patient with similar frequencies of TCR-Vβ in the CD4⁺CD28^null populations in PB and SF. (b) TCR-Vβ repertoire of CD4⁺CD28^null T cells (left) and CD4⁺CD28⁺ T cells (right) from PB and SF from one patient with different frequencies in TCR-Vβ in the CD4⁺CD28^null population in PB and SF. (c) TCR-Vβ repertoire of CD4⁺CD28^null T cells (left) and CD4⁺CD28⁺ T cells (right) from PB and SF in one patient: one of the two dominant CD4⁺CD28^null T-cell TCR-Vβ subsets in PB was present in SF with even higher frequencies than in PB, while the access of the other dominant subset in PB was significantly restricted. In this patient, the T cells were only screened for selected TCR-Vβ chains.