Characteristics Of T Cell Subsets,NK Cell Subsets And NKT Cells In Peripheral Blood And Liver Tissues Of HBV-related Primary Liver Cancer

Aim To explore the percentage of T cell subsets and programmed death-1（PD-1）expression,NK cell subsets and NKT cells in peripheral blood and liver tissues of hepatitis B virus（HBV）-related PLC patients and investigate their possible roles in the immune pathogenesis of HBV-related PLC.Methods Twenty-five patients with HBV-related PLC and 21 normal controls were enrolled.Peripheral blood,PLC tissues,adjacent non-carcinoma tissues（<2cm from PLC tissues）,surrounding non-carcinoma tissues（>2cm from PLC tissues）and normal liver samples were collected for the detection of T cell subsets and PD-1 expression on T cell subsets,NK cell subsets and NKT cells by flow cytometry.Results In the peripheral blood,the percentages of CD4⁺T cells,CD8⁺ T cells and the expression of PD-1 on T cell subsets,CD56^bright NK cells,CD56^dim NK cells and NKT cells as well as the ratio of CD4⁺/CD8⁺ T and CD56^brigrht/CD56^dim NK between HBV-related PLC patients and normal controls had no significant difference（P>0.05）.However,the percentage of CD8⁺ T cells（P<0.01）,CD56^dim NK cells（P<0.05）and NKT cells（P<0.05）in PLC tissues decreased significantly as compared with the adjacent non-carcinoma tissues,surrounding non-carcinoma tissues and normal controls.While the percentage of CD4⁺T cells（P<0.01）,CD4⁺/CD8⁺T（P<0.01）and PD-1 on CD8⁺T cells（P<0.05）were significantly increased in the PLC tissues.Conclusion An obvious immune imbalance was observed in the liver tissues of HBV-related PLC patients.The reduced percentage of antitumor effective cells and high expression of PD-1 the immune pathogenesis of HBV-related PLC.