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Updated: Aug 27, 2025

Preparation and Use of HIV-1 Infected Primary CD4+ T-Cells as Target Cells in Natural Killer Cell Cytotoxic Assays
Published on: March 14, 2011
Natural killer cell responses to human oncogenic γ-herpesvirus infections
1Viral Immunobiology, Institute of Experimental Immunology, University of Zürich, Switzerland.
Abstract:
The two γ-herpesviruses Epstein Barr virus (EBV) and Kaposi sarcoma associated herpesvirus (KSHV) are each associated with more than 1% of all tumors in humans. While EBV establishes persistent infection in nearly all adult individuals, KSHV benefits from this widespread EBV prevalence for its own persistence. Interestingly, EBV infection expands early differentiated NKG2A+KIR- NK cells that protect against lytic EBV infection, while KSHV co-infection drives accumulation of poorly functional CD56-CD16+ NK cells. Thus persistent γ-herpesvirus infections are sculptors of human NK cell repertoires and the respectively stimulated NK cell subsets should be considered for immunotherapies of EBV and KSHV associated malignancies.
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