Although the specific molecular pathways of T-cell exhaustion remain ambiguous, several transcriptional pathways have been implicated in T-cell exhaustion recently; among them Blimp-1, T-bet and NFAT2 were able to regulate exhausted T cells during chronic viral infection, suggesting a distinct lineage fate for this sub-population of T cells. The gene discussed is NFATC1; the disease is viral infectious disease.