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Memory in disguise

Nature Medicine volume 17, pages 1182–1183 (2011)Cite this article

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Memory T cells can be maintained for a lifetime, but the underlying mechanism has been hard to pin down. A new study identifies a subset of memory T cells with stem cell properties in humans and shows that these cells mediate a superior antitumor response in a mouse model of adoptive T cell therapy (pages 1290–1297).

One of immunologists' favorite exercises is to dissect the heterogeneity of immune cells through their surface marker expression patterns. This is not a trivial pursuit, as this approach has led to fundamental discoveries in many areas, from T and B cell development to immunological memory.

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Figure 1: During an immune response, naive T cells (TN) are primed by antigen-presenting cells (APCs) in secondary lymphoid organs.

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Affiliations

  1. Federica Sallusto and Antonio Lanzavecchia are at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine, Bellinzona, Switzerland.

    Federica Sallusto & Antonio Lanzavecchia

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  1. Federica Sallusto
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  2. Antonio Lanzavecchia
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Correspondence to Federica Sallusto or Antonio Lanzavecchia.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Sallusto, F., Lanzavecchia, A. Memory in disguise. Nat Med 17, 1182–1183 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm.2502

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