Although NO appears important in rodent immune responses, its involvement in the human immune system is unclear. We report that human NK cells express constitutive endothelial NO synthase mRNA and protein, but not detectable levels of inducible NO synthase. They produce NO following activation by coculture with target cells or cross-linking with anti-CD16 mAb, and production is increased in the...

BACKGROUND Although monocytes in peripheral blood are no longer considered to be a homogeneous population, associations between distinct monocyte subsets and cardiovascular disease have not been highlighted in large epidemiological studies. METHODS AND RESULTS The study included 700 randomly selected subjects from the cardiovascular arm of the Malmö Diet and Cancer study. Among these, 123 sub...

Genetic deficiencies provide insights into gene function in humans. Here we describe a patient with a very rare genetic deficiency of ADAM17. We show that the patient's PBMCs had impaired cytokine secretion in response to LPS stimulation, correlating with the clinical picture of severe bacteremia from which the patient suffered. ADAM17 was shown to cleave CD16, a major NK killer receptor. Funct...

Among all histological types, serous carcinomas account for up to 85%. Due pronounced heterogeneity (at the molecular and genetic level) chemoresistance, difficulties arise in finding active targets tumor elimination.
 Aim. To establish a link between population composition of tumor-associated immune cells microenvironment stage ovarian cancer.
 Materials methods. The analysis patholo...

Natural Killer (NK) cell education, which requires the engagement of inhibitory NK cell receptors (iNKRs) by their ligands, is important for generating self-tolerant functional NK cells. While the potency of NK cell education is directly related to their functional potential upon stimulation with HLA null cells, the influence of NK cell education on the potency of the antibody dependent cellula...

In human blood two monocyte populations can be distinguished, i.e., the CD14(++)CD16(-)DR(+) classical monocytes and the CD14(+)CD16(+)DR(++) proinflammatory monocytes that account for only 10% of all monocytes. We have studied TNF production in these two types of cells using three-color immunofluorescence and flow cytometry on whole peripheral blood samples stimulated with either LPS or with t...

Propriocidal regulation of T cells refers to apoptosis induced by interleukin 2 (IL-2) activation with subsequent antigen receptor stimulation. We examined whether natural killer (NK) cells exhibited cytokine- and ligand-induced death similar to activated T cells. Peripheral NK cells were examined for ligand-induced death using antibodies to surface moieties (CD2, CD3, CD8, CD16, CD56), with an...

HIV-1 persists in peripheral blood monocytes in individuals receiving highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) with viral suppression, despite these cells being poorly susceptible to infection in vitro. Because very few monocytes harbor HIV-1 in vivo, we considered whether a subset of monocytes might be more permissive to infection. We show that a minor CD16+ monocyte subset preferentially ...