American Journal of Transplantation 2006; 6: 505–513 ⃝C 2006 The Authors Blackwell Munksgaard Journal compilation ⃝C 2006 The American Society of Transplantation and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons doi: 10.1111/j.1600-6143.2005.01226.x Role of Natural Killer Cell Subsets in Cardiac Allograft Rejection M. E. McNerneya,†, K.-M. Leeb,†, P. Zhouc,†, Introduction L. Molineroc, M. Mashayekhic, D. Guziora, H. Sattarc, S. Kuppireddia, C.-R. Wanga, Understanding acute allograft rejection is of critical impor- V. Kumara,‡ and M.-L. Alegrec,∗,† tance for achieving successful organ transplant outcomes. In mice, CD4+ T cells are necessary and sufficient for acute + aDepartment of Pathology, The University of Chicago, rejection of cardiac allografts (1–5). Although the CD4 re- Chicago, Illinois, USA sponse is attenuated by disruption of CD28-B7 interaction, bDepartment of Biochemistry and Division of Brain Korea CD28-deficient mice retain the ability to acutely reject car- 21, Program for Biomedical Science, Korea University diac allografts (6–8). This is due to a rejection pathway that, College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea unlike in wild-type recipients, depends on CD4+, CD8+ cDepartment of Medicine, The University of Chicago, T cells (8) and NK1.1+ cells (9). However, the subset and Chicago, Illinois, USA mechanism by which NK1.1+ cells promote rejection re- ∗ Corresponding author: Maria-Luisa Alegre, mains unknown. CD28−/− mice have normal numbers of
[email protected] NK and NKT cells. Whereas function of NK cells is normal (10), NKT cells may have impaired cytokine response to To achieve donor-specific immune tolerance to allo- alpha-GalCer (11,12).