Long COVID is associated with lower percentages of mature, cytotoxic NK cell phenotypes, 2024, Tsao et al.

Long COVID is associated with lower percentages of mature, cytotoxic NK cell phenotypes
Tasha Tsao; Amanda M. Buck; Lilian Grimbert; Brian H. LaFranchi; Belen Altamirano Poblano; Emily A. Fehrman; Thomas Dalhuisen; Priscilla Y. Hsue; J. Daniel Kelly; Jeffrey N. Martin; Steven G. Deeks; Peter W. Hunt; Michael J. Peluso; Oscar A. Aguilar; Timothy J. Henrich

No abstract.

Link | PDF (The Journal of Clinical Investigation) [Open Access]

 

This matches previous findings in ME/CFS of lower than normal NK cell cytotoxicity.

Also random but it would be a cool feature to be able to add tags to someone else’s post. In this case would it be possible to add “cytotoxic” as a tag? cheers.

 

So this is about how many cytotoxic NK cells there are and the recent "Meta-analysis of Natural Killer (NK) cell cytotoxicity" was about average cytotoxicity of NK cells, right? Not necessarily related?

 

Done.

 

That’s possible, I’m not familiar with how “cytotoxicity” is measured, is it in relation to a single cell (or an average thereof)? If yes, then you are correct.

Though I would guess a lower number of cytotoxic NK cells would correlate with an average of lower cytotoxicity among NK cells.

 

Not really sure, hard to understand their description of measuring cytotoxicity in the meta analysis.

Why would you think that? I can see the possibility that with fewer NK cells, cytotoxicity of each one might be upregulated to compensate.

 

That’s a good point!

I’m basing this on no immune knowledge at all, but I was under the impression that cytotoxic NK cells were the ones who mainly produced cytotoxicity as opposed to other types, but yes I had not considered other types may still produce it or adapt. The body is a lot more complex than the models brainfoggy yann can come up with.