Acute exercise impacts AhR and PD-1 levels of CD8(+) T-cells—Exploratory results from a randomized cross-over trial comparing endurance versus resistance exercise

PURPOSE: The programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) has become a promising target in cancer immunotherapy. PD-1 expression of CD8(+) T-cells may be increased via the exploitation of aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) signaling with kynurenine (KYN) as a ligand. Since exercise affects KYN metabolism, we exploratory investigated the influence of acute exercise bouts on AhR and PD-1 levels of CD8(+) T-cells. METHOD: In this study, 24 healthy males (age: 24.6 ± 3.9 years; weight 83.9 ± 10.5 kg; height: 182.4 ± 6.2 cm) completed a single bout of endurance (EE) and resistance exercise (RE) in a randomly assigned order on separate days. Blood samples were drawn before (t0), after (t1), and 1 h after (t2) both conditions. T-cell populations, the level of cytoplasmic AhR, and surface PD-1 were assessed by flow cytometry. RESULTS: T-cell populations changed over time, indicated by an increase in the absolute numbers of CD3(+) lymphocytes after EE (p < .001) and RE (p = .036) and in PD-1(+) CD8(+) T-cells after EE (p = .021). Proportions of T-cell populations changed only after EE (t0–t2: p = .029; t1-t2: p = .006). The level of cytoplasmic AhR decreased immediately after exercise in both exercise conditions (EE: p = .009; RE: p = .036). The level of surface PD-1 decreased 1 h after EE (p = .005). CONCLUSION: We analyzed the level of surface PD-1 and cytoplasmic AhR following acute physical exercise for the first time. Especially EE was observed to impact both AhR and PD-1 levels, undermining its role as the AhR-PD-1 axis modulator. These results provide new insights into the impact of exercise on AhR-signaling, which could potentially be relevant for various chronic diseases. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s00421-020-04552-w) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.