Impact of aging on immunity in the context of COVID-19, HIV, and tuberculosis

Alba Grifoni; Tonino Alonzi; Galit Alter; Douglas McClain Noonan; Alan L Landay; Adriana Albini; Delia Goletti

doi:10.3389/fimmu.2023.1146704

Impact of aging on immunity in the context of COVID-19, HIV, and tuberculosis

Front Immunol. 2023 May 24:14:1146704. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2023.1146704. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Alba Grifoni¹, Tonino Alonzi², Galit Alter³, Douglas McClain Noonan^{4

5}, Alan L Landay⁶, Adriana Albini⁷, Delia Goletti²

Affiliations

¹ Center for Infectious Disease and Vaccine Research, La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI), La Jolla, CA, United States.
² Translational Research Unit, National Institute for Infectious Diseases "Lazzaro Spallanzani"-IRCCS, Rome, Italy.
³ Ragon Institute of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, United States.
⁴ Istituto Di Ricovero e Cura a Carattere Scientifico (IRCCS) MultiMedica, Milan, Italy.
⁵ Immunology and General Pathology Laboratory, Department of Biotechnology and Life Sciences, University of Insubria, Varese, Italy.
⁶ Department of Internal Medicine, Rush Medical College, Chicago, IL, United States.
⁷ IRCCS European Institute of Oncology IEO, Milan, Italy.

Abstract

Knowledge of aging biology needs to be expanded due to the continuously growing number of elderly people worldwide. Aging induces changes that affect all systems of the body. The risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer increases with age. In particular, the age-induced adaptation of the immune system causes a greater susceptibility to infections and contributes to the inability to control pathogen growth and immune-mediated tissue damage. Since the impact of aging on immune function, is still to be fully elucidated, this review addresses some of the recent understanding of age-related changes affecting key components of immunity. The emphasis is on immunosenescence and inflammaging that are impacted by common infectious diseases that are characterized by a high mortality, and includes COVID-19, HIV and tuberculosis.

Keywords: B cells; COVID-19; HIV; T cells; aging; immunosenescence; innate cells; tuberculosis.

Publication types

Review
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Aged
Aging
COVID-19*
HIV Infections*
Humans
Inflammation
Tuberculosis*

Grants and funding

DG and TA research is partially funded by the Italian Ministry of Health, Ricerca Corrente, Linea 4 and by TBVAC-HORIZON, funded by the European Union’s HORIZON program under Grant No. 101080309. This work was also supported by a grant from the Ministero della Salute COVID-2020-12371849 to DN and progetto RCR2021-23671212 on long COVID. Studies are partially funded by the Italian Ministry of Health Ricerca Corrente-IRCCS MultiMedica.