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Purification and Expansion of Mouse Invariant Natural Killer T Cells for in vitro and in vivo Studies
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Human invariant natural killer T cells: implications for immunotherapy

Tsuyoshi Takahashi1, Mineo Kurokawa2

  • 1Department of Hematology and Oncology, Graduate School of Medicine, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-8655, Japan.

International Journal of Hematology
|July 30, 2009
PubMed

Human invariant natural killer T cells are a unique lymphocyte population that have an invariant T-cell receptor and recognize glycolipids instead of peptides in the restriction of CD1d molecules. These natural killer T cells play important roles in anti-tumor immunity, transplantation immunity, allergy, autoimmunity and microbial immunity. Since human natural killer T cells show high-level biological activity such as cytokine production, an anti-tumor effect and regulatory T-cell control, they may be a useful tool in immune-cell therapy. In this review, we summarize the immune responses mediated by human natural killer T cells, especially in tumor and transplantation immunity, and discuss their potential in clinical applications.

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