Distinct Surface Expression of Activating Receptor Ly49H Drives Differential Expansion of NK Cell Clones upon Murine Cytomegalovirus Infection (Immunity)

Upon infection, T cell clones harboring TCRs of distinct antigen affinity undergo differential expansion. Whether NK cells show similar clonal dynamics is not clear. By using retrogenic color-barcoding and single-cell adoptive transfers, Grassmann et al. show that NK cells adapt to cytomegalovirus infection by differential expansion of individual clones that heritably express distinct levels of virus-specific activating receptor Ly49H.