Club cells surviving influenza A virus infection induce temporary nonspecific antiviral immunity

Significance After influenza A virus infection, the host is protected from subsequent unrelated respiratory virus infections for a temporary period. Although this phenomenon has been reported both in animal models and human clinical data, the mechanism for this antiviral immunity is incompletely understood. In this article, we demonstrate that club cells surviving direct infection by influenza A virus are reprogramed to promote an antiviral lung environment, and the depletion of “survivor cells” eliminates the postinfluenza window of nonspecific immunity. These findings demonstrate a type of immunity that does not fit into the classical innate or adaptive models and may inform the future designs of vaccines, where eliciting nonspecific immunity would be beneficial. A brief window of antigen-nonspecific protection has been observed after influenza A virus (IAV) infection. Although this temporary immunity has been assumed to be the result of residual nonspecific inflammation, this period of induced immunity has not been fully studied. Because IAV has long been characterized as a cytopathic virus (based on its ability to rapidly lyse most cell types in culture), it has been a forgone conclusion that directly infected cells could not be contributing to this effect. Using a Cre recombinase-expressing IAV, we have previously shown that club cells can survive direct viral infection. We show here not only that these cells can eliminate all traces of the virus and survive but also that they acquire a heightened antiviral response phenotype after surviving. Moreover, we experimentally demonstrate temporary nonspecific viral immunity after IAV infection and show that surviving cells are required for this phenotype. This work characterizes a virally induced modulation of the innate immune response that may represent a new mechanism to prevent viral diseases.