[Chemiluminescence assay for human natural killer cell activity].

Recently it has been shown that the natural killer (NK)-target cell interaction results in an immediate burst of chemiluminescence. In this paper we investigated to apply chemilumines cence assay for the evaluation of human NK cell activities. Degrees of chemiluminescence were dependent on the concentration of lymphocytes or tar. get cells, but optimal concentrations of lymphocytes and target cell were 2×106/ml, 3× 106/ml respectively. The responder cell that generates chemiluminescence after target-effecfor interaction is most likely a lymphocyte for a variety of reasons. First, monocyte-depleted fraction containedmore than 95% of lymphocytes. Removal of NK cells with monoclonal anti HNK-1 antibody and complement abolished the chemiluminescence response. Lymphocytes or target cells (K562) generated very little chemiluminescence response. Furthermore, cell to interaction between allogeneic or autologus lymphocytes did not generate any chemi luminescence. A survery of 10 normal peripheral lymphocytes revealed a well correlation (P<0.01) of NK cell activities between chemiluminescence and 51 Cr release assays. These results propose that chemiluminescence assay would be another assay system for human NK cell activities.