Human lung organoid modelling of tissue-resident antiviral T cell responses.

Long-term human lung organoids reveal tissue-resident memory T cells can control SARS-CoV-2 infection independently of secondary lymphoid tissues.

• Why it matters: Understanding local immune responses in the lung is crucial for developing effective vaccines and therapies against respiratory pathogens, but current models lack the complexity to study tissue-resident immunity in detail.
• What they did: Researchers created adult human distal lung organoids that preserved epithelial, stromal, and immune cells, including tissue-resident T cells, and exposed them to SARS-CoV-2 to study immune responses and T cell memory.
• The result: The organoids showed SARS-CoV-2-specific tissue-resident T cell responses that limited infection, supporting the potential for local vaccination strategies and providing a platform to study human tissue-resident immunity.