uterine natural killer cell 3, human
uterine natural killer cell 3, human
A uterine natural killer subset found in the endometrial lining during the non-pregnant state (Garcia-Alonso et al., 2021) and in the decidua during pregnancy (Vento-Tormo et al., 2018), becoming the dominant uNK subset late in pregnancy. It expresses the uterine resident marker CD49a and is distinguished from uNK1 and uNK2 by CD160 (Marečková et al., 2024) and CD103 expression, the absence of CD39, and low KIR levels (Whettlock et al., 2022). Resembling intraepithelial ILC1 cells, uNK3 primarily supports uterine immune defense (Huhn et al., 2020) and indirectly influences trophoblast behavior through chemokine secretion, such as CCL5 (Vento-Tormo et al., 2018).