Flow Cytometric Evaluation of Surface CD56 Expression on Activated Natural Killer Cells as Functional Marker

Surface CD56 is the most important cell marker for defining NK cells. However, the relationship between the expression of surface CD56 and NK cell activity has not yet been elucidated in detail. Thirteen healthy volunteers were enrolled in the present study. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were stimulated with rIL-2 or rIL-12 (1, 10, 100 U/mL) for 18 h at 37°C. After incubation, surface CD56 expression on NK cells was evaluated using a flow cytometric analysis. A colorimetric-based lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) assay was used for experiments on cytotoxicity. IFN-γ mRNA gene expression was quantified by real-time PCR. The expression level of surface CD56 on NK cells, cytotoxicity, and IFN-γ mRNA gene expression were significantly increased by the rIL-2 and rIL-12 stimulations. In addition, a positive correlation was found between surface CD56 expression and cytotoxic activity or IFN-γ mRNA gene expression. We revealed that the quantification of surface CD56 expression was applicable to the evaluation of cytotoxicity and IFN-γ production in activated NK cells. These results suggest that the measurement of surface CD56 expression represent an easy and rapidly reproducible technique to evaluate the activated state of NK cells and monitor NK cell activity in immunotherapy. J. Med. Invest. 63: 199-203, August, 2016.