Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

In the absence of T cells, natural killer cells protect from mortality due to HSV-1 encephalitis

1999; Elsevier BV; Volume: 93; Issue: 1-2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/s0165-5728(98)00236-7

1872-8421

Heiko Adler, Janice L. Beland, Nadia C. Del-Pan, Lester Kobzik, Raymond A. Sobel, Ilonna J. Rimm,

Cytomegalovirus and herpesvirus research

The importance of natural killer (NK) cells in the resistance to herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1), a common infection of immunocompromised patients, is unclear. Previous data on the role of NK cells in murine HSV-1 infection has been contradictory. Adoptive transfer studies suggested that NK cells mediated resistance to HSV-1, but in vivo depletion approaches demonstrated that NK cells were not important. We studied the course of HSV-1 infection after intranasal (i.n.) inoculation of E26 mice (lacking NK and T cells), T cell knockout (T cell ko) mice (lacking T cells only), or normal control mice. The E26 mice showed greater mortality and an impaired ability to clear virus from lung and brain compared to T cell ko mice and control mice, and had severe necrotizing HSV-1 encephalitis. Therefore, the data support the hypothesis that NK cells play an important role in the natural defense of murine HSV-1 infection.