Malaria is a severe infectious disease with relatively high mortality, thus 
having been a scourge of humanity. There are a few candidate malaria vaccines 
that have shown a protective efficacy in humans against malaria. One of the 
candidate human malaria vaccines, which is based on human malaria sporozoites 
and called PfSPZ Vaccine, has been shown to protect a significant proportion of 
vaccine recipients from getting malaria. PfSPZ Vaccine elicits a potent response 
of hepatic CD8+ T cells that are specific for malaria antigens in non-human 
primates. To further characterize hepatic CD8+ T cells induced by the 
sporozoite-based malaria vaccine in a mouse model, we have used a cutting-edge 
Single-cell Barcode (SCBC) assay, a recently emerged approach/method for 
investigating the nature of T-cells responses during infection or cancer. Using 
the SCBC technology, we have identified a population of hepatic CD8+ T cells 
that are polyfunctional at a single cell level only in a group of vaccinated 
mice upon malaria challenge. The cytokines/chemokines secreted by these 
polyfunctional CD8+ T-cell subsets include MIP-1α, RANTES, IFN-γ, and/or IL-17A, 
which have shown to be associated with protective T-cell responses against 
certain pathogens. Therefore, a successful induction of such polyfunctional 
hepatic CD8+ T cells may be a key to the development of effective human malaria 
vaccine. In addition, the SCBC technology could provide a new level of 
diagnostic that will allow for a more accurate determination of vaccine 
efficacy.