Fig. 1

Immunological functional tests of the patient. Intracellular expression of perforin in CD56⁺ NK cells was assessed by flow cytometry (a). Degranulation potential of CD56⁺ NK cells was assessed by flow cytometry after overnight co-culture with target cells K562. Plots show the surface expression of CD107a on unstimulated and stimulated NK cells (b). Lymphocytes subsets were analysed by flow cytometry: T cells were identified as CD3⁺ CD56⁻ CD19⁻; within the CD3⁺ gate, γδ-T cells were gated as CD3⁺ γδ-TCR⁺ αβ-TCR⁻ (c). T cell proliferation was assessed by a standard [³H]-thymidine incorporation assay following stimulation with anti-CD3 (OKT3) or PHA (d). The results are shown for first determination while on 2 mg/Kg of methylprednisolone. They were repeated on a lower dose of oral prednisone (0.25 mg/Kg) with similar results