Tuberculosis, bacterial infection caused by the bacillus Mycobacterium tuberculosis, is still causing millions of deaths worldwide.

Currently, active tuberculosis (ATB) diagnosis presents several gaps, including need for faster turn-around-time (TAT), high cost, and need of potential for Point-of-Care (POC) tests with acceptable sensitivity and specificity. Towards the global goals for control of tuberculosis disease and transmission, we need improved, more sensitive, ideally faster, and lower-cost methods of ATB diagnosis, with tests that can be adaptable towards use in treatment follow-up (to predict cure or relapse/reinfection), as well as potential surrogate markers of TB vaccine responses. The current newest tests have many advantages, but also several limitations.

Immuno-diagnosis of active tuberculosis is a promising approach. A lot of work has been done in this regard, but more research is still needed. The immuno-diagnosis of TB displays several potential advantages, such as the ability to “estimate” the Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) body load; but also, the potential to distinguish between ATB and Latent Tuberculosis Infection (LTBI).

In addition, immune-based POC tests for ATB diagnosis have the potential for low invasiveness, minimal training needs, simplicity, and low cost. The field of active tuberculosis (ATB) immuno-diagnosis is broad and has potential for achieving an “optimal diagnostic test”, but more research is needed to achieve the goal of developing tests user-friendly, more sensitive, and specific to diagnose, or predict ATB.

The aim of this Research Topic is to provide important insights on the immuno-diagnosis of active tuberculosis. We welcome the submission of Reviews (Mini Reviews, Reviews, Opinions) as well as novel Original Research, Methods, Opinion and Perspective articles focusing, but not limited to, the following sub-topics:

1. Innovative approaches including, but not limited to

a. Humoral – antibody response towards serological diagnosis

b. Cell-mediated responses – various cytokines/chemokines responses in different combinations

c. Blood transcriptomic signature and blood immune-profiling

d. Immune metabolic marker (e.g., endocrine markers, pro-inflammatory markers) for the diagnosis of ATB

2. Novel antigens, or combinations of different antigens stimulation responses

3. Studies using body samples, other than blood, like saliva, sputum, exudative fluids, bronco alveolar lavage (BAL), breath condensate, urine and pleural, ascitic or pericardial fluids leading to novel immune markers for the diagnosis of ATB (pulmonary and extrapulmonary)

4. Different diagnostic approaches such as lateral flow assay (LFA), and other techniques towards faster lower-cost diagnosis.

Impact

Frontiers in Immunology

Microbial Immunology