{"id":78442,"date":"2026-10-09T23:42:52","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T21:42:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/2026\/10\/09\/effects-of-natural-killer-cell-depletion-on-innate-and-adaptive-immune-responses-to-covid-mrna-vaccination\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T23:42:52","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T21:42:52","slug":"effects-of-natural-killer-cell-depletion-on-innate-and-adaptive-immune-responses-to-covid-mrna-vaccination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/2026\/10\/09\/effects-of-natural-killer-cell-depletion-on-innate-and-adaptive-immune-responses-to-covid-mrna-vaccination\/","title":{"rendered":"Effects of natural killer cell depletion on innate and adaptive immune responses to COVID mRNA vaccination"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p><b>J Immunol<\/b>. 2026 Oct 1;215(10):vkag266. doi: 10.1093\/jimmun\/vkag266.<\/p>\n<p><b>ABSTRACT<\/b><\/p>\n<p>This study assessed the role that natural killer (NK) cells play in a murine model of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Spike mRNA vaccination. Flow cytometric analyses revealed that mRNA vaccination results in recruitment and maturation of NK cells in the spleen. Primed (CD27+ CD11b+) NK cells increased from 0.35% of all CD45+ cells pre-vaccination to 2.44% at 4 d post-vaccination, while terminally mature (CD27- CD11b+) NK cells increased from 0.85% of all CD45+ cells pre-vaccination to 3.91% at 7 d post-vaccination. We next evaluated Spike mRNA and protein expression, circulating cytokines, and Spike-specific antibody and T cell responses in mice depleted of NK cells before primary or booster vaccination. Depleting NK cells prior to mRNA vaccination resulted in decreased serum levels of IL-1\u03b2 and IL-6 at 6 and 24 h, respectively, after vaccination. NK depletion also caused a significant reduction in Spike mRNA expression in draining lymph nodes, with greater than 5-fold reductions in Spike mRNA copies\/\u03bcL, as measured by digital droplet PCR. Three weeks post-vaccination with 1 \u03bcg mRNA LNP, Spike-specific CD25+ CD4 T cells were also significantly decreased. Despite these decreases in early pro-inflammatory cytokines, Spike mRNA expression, and Spike-specific CD4 T cells, NK depletion had little impact on Spike-specific antibody levels at 1 and 6 mo following single vaccination, as well as at 3 wk after booster vaccination. Together, these data suggest that NK cells contribute to early inflammatory responses induced by mRNA vaccination, yet their depletion does not impair the magnitude of long-term adaptive immune responses induced by this platform.<\/p>\n<p>PMID:<a href=\"https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/42853633\/?utm_source=SimplePie&amp;utm_medium=rss&amp;utm_content=2985117R&amp;ff=20261009174252&amp;v=2.20.1\">42853633<\/a> | DOI:<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1093\/jimmun\/vkag266\">10.1093\/jimmun\/vkag266<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>J Immunol. 2026 Oct 1;215(10):vkag266. doi: 10.1093\/jimmun\/vkag266. ABSTRACT This study assessed the role that natural killer (NK) cells play in a murine model of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Spike mRNA vaccination. Flow cytometric analyses revealed that mRNA vaccination results in recruitment and maturation of NK cells in the spleen. Primed (CD27+ CD11b+) &#8230; <a title=\"Effects of natural killer cell depletion on innate and adaptive immune responses to COVID mRNA vaccination\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/2026\/10\/09\/effects-of-natural-killer-cell-depletion-on-innate-and-adaptive-immune-responses-to-covid-mrna-vaccination\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Effects of natural killer cell depletion on innate and adaptive immune responses to COVID mRNA vaccination\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,71],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-publicaciones","category-the-journal-of-immunology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78442\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmuno.es\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}