IMMUNOLOGY2025™ Conference Recordings-Understanding the complexity of human plasma cells

Video Transcription

Video Summary

The speaker discussed the complexity of human plasma cells, focusing on long-lived plasma cells that maintain protective antibodies for life and are central to vaccine durability. She explained that plasma cells arise through germinal center responses and mature in the bone marrow, where they undergo major transcriptional and epigenetic changes rather than simply surviving passively.<br /><br />A major theme was the need for a human plasma cell atlas to map plasma cell subsets across tissues such as blood, lymph node, spleen, nasal tissue, and bone marrow. She highlighted marked heterogeneity in surface markers, morphology, isotypes, and secretion rates. Long-lived bone marrow plasma cells were shown to secrete more antibody than early blood ASCs.<br /><br />The talk also introduced MENSA, a diagnostic platform that measures newly synthesized antibodies from circulating ASCs, providing a “today’s news” snapshot of recent immune activity. This method helped identify infections and analyze responses in long COVID and vaccination.<br /><br />She described bone marrow studies showing that flu and tetanus responses can enter the long-lived compartment, while SARS-CoV-2 responses often do not. Finally, bulk and single-cell RNA/ATAC-seq revealed distinct pro-survival and epigenetic programs in mature plasma cells, including NF-kappaB and BCL2-associated changes, which may inform therapies targeting pathogenic antibodies.

Keywords

human plasma cells

long-lived plasma cells

vaccine durability

bone marrow

plasma cell atlas

MENSA diagnostic

single-cell RNA ATAC-seq