Inducible LAK cell responses were studied in HIV-seropositive individuals lacking clinical symptoms, and overt AIDS patients. Inducible LAK cell responses have been operationally defined as, non-MHC-restricted and antigen-nonspecific cytotoxic activity observed following IL-2 stimulation. HIV-seropositive asymptomatic individuals exhibited an enhanced LAK cell response against HIV-infected targets while lysis of uninfected targets remained at control levels. LAK activity of AIDS patients however, was significantly diminished when compared to healthy controls. Immunomagnetic negative selection depletion experiments indicated that LAK cell activity is mediated primarily by CD56-expressing lymphocytes, both at the progenitor and effector cell level. Of interest, in HIV-seropositive asymptomatic individuals we observed the emergence of a second CD8-expressing cytotoxic population that mediates IL-2-induced non-MHC-restricted and antigen-nonspecific cytotoxicity. Overall we demonstrated that CD56-expressing LAK cells of HIV-seropositive patients exhibited a decreased ability to mediate cytotoxicity on a per cell basis against a panel of different targets. In vivo, this inhibition may be amplified by decreases in absolute numbers of CD56-expressing lymphocytes per ml of blood. HIV-infection therefore results in dramatic changes on the number, function and phenotype of the effector cells mediating IL-2 inducible LAK cell responses.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.39458 |
| Date | January 1992 |
| Creators | Gryllis, Chryssa |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Doctor of Philosophy (Division of Surgical Research.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001305392, proquestno: NN80464, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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