The molecular mechanism of lymphocyte-mediated tumor cell lysis.

Lymphocyte-mediated cytolysis is an important mechanism of immune defense and possibly also of immune surveillance against cancer. Recent major advances in the understanding of its molecular mechanism came from the discovery that lysis was associated with the formation of membrane lesions on target cells caused by cytoplasmic granules from cytolytic lymphocytes. In this review Eckhard Podack summarizes our current knowledge of the molecular events resulting in target cell destruction by cytolytic T-lymphocytes (CTL) and natural killer (NK) cells.