Abstract

The immune system is routinely exposed to dead cells during normal cell turnover, injury and infection. Mechanisms must exist to discriminate between different forms of cell death to correctly eliminate pathogens and promote healing while avoiding responses to self, which can result in autoimmunity. However, an effective immune response against host tissue is often needed to eliminate tumours following treatment with chemotherapeutic agents that trigger tumour cell death. Consequently, a central problem in immunology is to understand how the immune system determines whether cell death is immunogenic, tolerogenic or 'silent'.

Author affiliations

1. Department of Immunology, St Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee 38105, USA.
2. Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis, Missouri 63110, USA.
3. Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale, U805, F-94805 Villejuif, France.
4. Center of Clinical Investigation BT507, F-94805 Villejuif, France.
5. Institut Gustave Roussy, F94805 Villejuif, France.
6. Faculté Paris Sud-Université, Paris 11, F-94805 Kremlin-Bicêtre, France.
7. Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale, U848, F-94805 Villejuif, France.

Correspondence to: Douglas R. Green¹ Email: douglas.green@stjude.org

Correspondence to: Guido Kroemer^5,7 Email: kroemer@igr.fr

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