A HIGHLY SENSITIVE WHOLE-BLOOD NATURAL-KILLER-CELL ASSAY

The assessment of natural killer cell activity at baseline and the mon itoring of this activity during treatment is important in many disease s especially in patients with cancer and AIDS. An optimised and standa rdised whole blood chromium release assay is described using K562 cell s, the standard target erythroleukaemic cell line, The tumour cell lys is observed using whole blood is comparable to that obtained with the standard 4 h lysis assay using peripheral blood mononuclear cells as e ffector cells. Results with the whole blood assay are reproducible whe n the incubation with K562 cells is performed over a period of 18 h. T he assay necessitates only 0.6 mi of blood collected in 10 IU/ml of so dium heparin as the anticoagulant. In this report, depletion experimen ts, also standardised using whole blood, show that the effector cells in the whole blood assay are contained within the CD56 + cell populati on. This assay will be of interest where the immunological status of p atients with different diseases need to be frequently monitored. (C) 1 998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.