Establishing the reference intervals of NK cell functions in healthy adults

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• 作者：Hongyan Hou^a ; Lie Mao^a ; Juan Wang^b ; Weiyong Liu^a ; Yanfang Lu^a ; Jing Yu^a ; Yu Zhou^a ; Liyan Mao^a ; Feng Wang^a ; ^{fengwang@tjh.tjmu.edu.cn" class="auth_mail" title="E-mail the corresponding author} ; Ziyong Sun^a ; ^{zysun@tjh.tjmu.edu.cn" class="auth_mail" title="E-mail the corresponding author}
• 关键词：Natural killer cells ; IFN-γ ; CD107a ; Reference intervals
• 刊名：Human Immunology
• 出版年：2016
• 出版时间：August 2016
• 年：2016
• 卷：77
• 期：8
• 页码：637-642
• 全文大小：1059 K

文摘

Natural killer (NK) cells play a key role in host defense against microbial pathogens. Establishing the reference intervals (RIs) of NK cell functions would be valuable in assessing the immune status of hosts. We evaluated the NK cell activity in healthy adults. We further established and validated the RIs of representative NK cell functions. Flow cytometry was used to evaluate the cytokine production and CD107a degranulation of NK cells. Levels of soluble IFN-γ in the culture supernatants were evaluated by ELISA. Our results demonstrated that the intracellular IFN-γ production of NK cells was positively correlated with CD107a expression and soluble IFN-γ levels. There were no significant differences in NK cell functions between different age and gender groups. The mean values and RIs of representative NK cell functions are as following: IFN-γ⁺ NK cells (%): 28.09 (11.3–51.95); CD107a⁺ NK cells (%): 17.90 (9.852–27.56); soluble IFN-γ (pg/ml): 330.4 (41.38–717.8). In addition, the intracellular IFN-γ production and degranulation activity of NK cells in patients with colorectal cancer were significantly lower than that in healthy adults. Our study has established the RIs of NK cell functions in healthy adults, which might be used for monitoring the immune status of the hosts.