CD8A and diabetes mellitus: Thus, during enteroviral infection of genetically susceptible individuals, the possible activation of local NK cells by IFN-α in islets can be a primary cause leading to infected beta cells cytolysis, release of beta-cell antigens and hence activation of antigen-specific CD8 cytotoxic T cells, which is consistent with studies reporting that IFN-α expressed in insulin-producing beta cells can induce T1D in transgenic mice and that beta cells are especially sensitive to NK cell-mediated killing in BB/W diabetic and diabetes-prone rats [157,158,159].