About Lymphocytes

In short, lymphocytes identify foreign substances and germs (bacteria or viruses) in the body, then produce antibodies and cells that specifically target them. It takes from several days to weeks for lymphocytes to recognize and attack a new foreign substance.


The main lymphocyte sub-types are

B cells

Special B cells produce specific antibodies, proteins that help attack destroy foreign substances like bacteria and toxins.


T-cells

T-cells attack body cells (virus-infected cells, foreign tissue, and cancer cells) themselves, when they have been taken over by viruses or become cancerous. They also produce a number of substances that regulate the immune response.


NK Cells

Among other functions, natural killer cells destroy cancer cells and virus-infected cells through phagocytosis and by producing substances that can kill such cells.


Null cells

An early population of lymphocytes bearing neither T-cell nor B-cell differentiation antigens.


Lymphocytes are actually small cells with virtually no cytoplasm, found in the blood, in all tissue and in lymphoid organs, such as lymph nodes, the tonsils, thymus gland, spleen and Peyer's patches.

Normally, the body keeps a precise balance in which lymphocyte growth is matched by lymphocyte death. People with constantly enlarged lymph nodes or spleen, along with autoimmune disease, immunodeficiency, lymphoma, or other immune problems affecting lymphocytes may have an abnormality of the immune system in the cell growth and cell death processes that regulate lymphocyte homeostasis.


See also T - lymphocyte count test (T cell counts)