# How do NK cells \[large granular lymphocytes\] survive its own components?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [August 8, 2021, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225 "2021-08-08T02:22:57Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![longtry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/839c29/32.png) [@longtry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/longtry)\
**Post date:** [August 8, 2021, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225/1 "2021-08-08T02:22:57Z")

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I’ve just read that NK cells have perforins and granzymes that create holes and then activate suicide of other cells. How do they ‘store’ those proteins to keep them from destroying themselves? Whatever mechanism(s) they use, does that mean NK cells are invincible - in other words, they just can’t die even if other cells want to kill them?

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**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\
**Post date:** [August 8, 2021, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225/2 "2021-08-08T04:49:42Z")

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Am I the only one who thought this post was about North Korean communist cells?

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**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\
**Post date:** [August 8, 2021, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225/3 "2021-08-08T05:02:30Z")

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Nope.

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**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\
**Post date:** [August 8, 2021, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225/4 "2021-08-08T13:47:46Z")

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For those wondering what this has to do with North Korea, here is the wikipedia article on Natural Killer cells (aka NK cells):

> **[Natural killer cell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_killer_cell)**
>
> Pages for logged out editors learn more
> 
> Natural killer cells, also known as NK cells or large granular lymphocytes (LGL), are a type of cytotoxic lymphocyte critical to the innate immune system that belong to the rapidly expanding family of known innate lymphoid cells (ILC) and represent 5–20% of all circulating lymphocytes in humans. The role of NK cells is analogous to that of cytotoxic T cells in the vertebrate adaptive immune response. NK cells provide rapid responses to virus-infec...

Moderator Note - thread title also edited for clarity

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**Author:** ![longtry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/839c29/32.png) [@longtry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/longtry)\
**Post date:** [August 12, 2021, 11:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-nk-cells-large-granular-lymphocytes-survive-its-own-components/948225/5 "2021-08-12T11:24:30Z")

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Thank you. Re-reading that post, I do realize the confusing thing myself 😛