Vanderkerken K, Bouwens L, Van Rooijen N, Van den Berg K, Baekeland M, Wisse E
Laboratory for Cell Biology and Histology, Free University Brussels, Belgium.
Hepatology. 1995 Jul;22(1):283-90.
Pit cells, or hepatic natural killer (NK) cells, present in rat liver sinusoids, represent an organ-associated NK cell population, with a higher level of activation and a different morphology when compared with peripheral blood NK cells. These cells are the result of an influx of peripheral blood NK cells in the liver microenvironment, followed by an activation or differentiation process toward the highly activated phenotype. In this work we investigated the role of Kupffer cells in this differentiation process of NK cells in the liver sinusoids. In vivo elimination of Kupffer cells with the macrophage cytotoxic drug dichloromethylene diphosphonate induced a decrease in number of hepatic NK cells that paralleled that of Kupffer cells. This effect was further investigated in vitro. Kupffer cell-conditioned medium appeared to enhance the viability, tumor-cytotoxic activity, and adherence of hepatic NK cells to liver endothelial cells in vitro. We conclude therefore that Kupffer cells, present in the microenvironment of the liver sinusoids, play an essential role in the differentiation process of peripheral blood NK cells to the highly activated hepatic NK cell population.
肝窦中的贮脂细胞，即肝自然杀伤（NK）细胞，代表了一种与器官相关的NK细胞群体，与外周血NK细胞相比，其活化水平更高，形态也有所不同。这些细胞是外周血NK细胞流入肝脏微环境，随后朝着高度活化表型进行活化或分化过程的结果。在这项研究中，我们调查了库普弗细胞在肝窦中NK细胞这一分化过程中的作用。用巨噬细胞细胞毒性药物二氯亚甲基二膦酸盐在体内清除库普弗细胞，导致肝NK细胞数量减少，且减少程度与库普弗细胞平行。在体外对这一效应进行了进一步研究。库普弗细胞条件培养基似乎能增强肝NK细胞在体外的活力、肿瘤细胞毒性活性以及与肝内皮细胞的黏附能力。因此，我们得出结论，存在于肝窦微环境中的库普弗细胞在外周血NK细胞分化为高度活化的肝NK细胞群体的过程中发挥着重要作用。
