{"doi":"10.1093/jimmun/vkaf283.243","title":"eEF2K Enhances Virus-Specific Effector CD8+ T Cell Responses During Viral Infection 2314","abstract":"Abstract Description Eukaryotic Elongation Factor-2 Kinase (eEF2K), a well-known negative regulator of protein synthesis, has been extensively studied in cancer biology, yet its role in immune cells, particularly T cells, remains underexplored. In this study, we investigated eEF2K’s impact on T cells during vaccinia virus (VACV) infection. Our results demonstrate that eEF2K-deficient (eEF2K-/-) mice exhibit an increased proportion of VACV-specific effector CD8+ T cells without compromising the formation of VACV-specific memory T cells. RNA-sequencing analysis further revealed that eEF2K-/- VACV-specific effector CD8+ T cells possess enhanced functionality, improving their effectiveness in combating viral infection during the effector stage. Notably, we identified TRAF3 as a key mediator of the amplified antiviral response observed in eEF2K-/- VACV-specific effector CD8+ T cells. These findings suggest that targeting eEF2K may be a promising approach to boost effector CD8+ T cell responses during viral infections. Funding Sources Supported by NIH R01CA221867 and R21AI167793. Topic Categories Immune Response Regulation: Molecular Mechanisms (IRM)","journal":"The Journal of Immunology","year":2025,"id":582600,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9517,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2025-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":486869,"name":"Liqing Wang","orcid":"0009-0000-9896-3793","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1494992,"name":"Jim Jim Song","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":486874,"name":"Xiaofang Xiong","orcid":"0000-0001-8276-4415","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:58:59.653747Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}