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Frontiers of Medicine >> 2018, Volume 12, Issue 3 doi: 10.1007/s11684-017-0584-x

γδ T cells in liver diseases

  1. School of Pharmacy, Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230032, China
  2.  Institute of Immunology and CAS Key Laboratory of Innate Immunity and Chronic Disease, School of Life Sciences and Medical Center, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
  3. Collaborative Innovation Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, State Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, First Affiliated Hospital, College of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310003, China

Available online: 2018-05-04

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Abstract

γδ T cells display unique developmental, distributional, and functional patterns and can rapidly respond to various insults and contribute to diverse diseases. Different subtypes of γδ T cells are produced in the thymus prior to their migration to peripheral tissues. γδ T cells are enriched in the liver and exhibit liver-specific features. Accumulating evidence reveals that γδ T cells play important roles in liver infection, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, autoimmune hepatitis, liver fibrosis and cirrhosis, and liver cancer and regeneration. In this study, we review the properties of hepatic γδ T cells and summarize the roles of γδ T cells in liver diseases. We believe that determining the properties and functions of γδ T cells in liver diseases enhances our understanding of the pathogenesis of liver diseases and is useful for the design of novel γδ T cell-based therapeutic regimens for liver diseases.

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