As a part of our immune defences, cytotoxic T cells — or killer T cells — seek out and destroy cells that are infected or cancerous. This process is essential for the body’s defence against diseases.
These specialised immune cells are armed with lytic granules containing two key components for immune attack: perforin (proteins that punch holes in the target cells) and granzymes (which gain access via these holes and ultimately kill disease-causing cells).
T cells snuggle up to targeted diseased cells and form an intimate junction between the two, called the ‘cytotoxic immunological synapse’.
A research team at UNSW Sydney’s EMBL Australia Node in Single Molecule Science in the School of Biomedical Sciences has found that mechanical forces generated by T cells influence how effectively perforin can punch through tumour cell membranes. In a paper published today in Developmental Cell, they describe the cell interactions and the integration of forces at both the front and rear of the cell.
The researchers detected physical forces within T cells that propel lytic granules toward the immunological synapse where their payloads are released. These forces also enable T cells to grab onto regions of the cancer cell membrane where the membranes of both immune and target cells are pulled and manipulated.
“It was very exciting to discover that, in addition to its mechanical tension and biochemical configuration, the shape of the target cell membrane plays an important role in T cell mediated cancer cell killing,” said Dr Daryan Kempe at UNSW Medicine & Health who co-led the research.
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