Figure 3

The presence of UL16 affects the surface expression of an NKG2D ligand in the context of CMV infection. HFFF2 fibroblasts were either mock infected (A) or infected with the laboratory strain of CMV AD169 (B) and with the knock out virus lacking UL16 gene, ΔUL16 (C). Cells were stained using NKG2D-Ig protein (solid line) or control human IgG1 (filled histograms) and analysed using flow cytometry. Surface expression of NKG2D ligands was much reduced in the CMV infected cells and recovered in the absence of UL16. Data are representative of several experiments and results obtained using both human fibroblast cell lines Hs27 and HFFF2 were comparable.