Obesity-linked metabolic diseases, such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, are associated with a state of low-grade inflammation. Recent research has elucidated many of the mediators and mechanisms that are involved in inflammation-associated metabolic disease, revealing links between metabolism and the immune system on many levels. This research has provided insight into how inflammation drives type 2 diabetes, how adipose-tissue-derived mediators are involved in inflammation and metabolic disease, how immune cells behave in adipose tissues and how T cell metabolism is linked to T cell fate. Such advances open up the exciting possibility of treating obesity-associated complications with immunomodulatory strategies.
The Review and Perspective articles in this Focus on metabolism and immunology, together with recent Research Highlights and an accompanying Web Library of the most relevant recent publications from Nature Publishing Group, describe our current understanding of this emerging field.
All of the articles in this Focus are available free to registered users until August 2011, thanks to support from sanofi-aventis.
Foreword
Immunometabolism: an emerging frontier
Diane Mathis & Steven E. Shoelson
doi:10.1038/nri2922
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 81-83 (2011)
Research Highlights
Macrophages: Preventing lipid overload
doi:10.1038/nri2919
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 72 (2011)
Regulatory T cells: Weight watchers
doi:10.1038/nri2920
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 73 (2011)
In Brief
doi:10.1038/nri2931
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 73 (2011)
Cytokines: Regulating energy stores
doi:10.1038/nri2928
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 77-78 (2011)
Reviews
Adipokines in inflammation and metabolic disease
Noriyuki Ouchi, Jennifer L. Parker, Jesse J. Lugus & Kenneth Walsh
doi:10.1038/nri2921
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 85-97 (2011)
Adipose tissues and infiltrating immune cells produce numerous bioactive factors that have pro-inflammatory or anti-inflammatory activities. Here, the authors describe how dysregulated production of these so-called adipokines can contribute to the pathogenesis of obesity-linked metabolic disease.
Type 2 diabetes as an inflammatory disease
Marc Y. Donath & Steven E. Shoelson
doi:10.1038/nri2925
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 98-107 (2011)
The cellular stresses that are proposed to underlie impaired insulin secretion and sensitivity in type 2 diabetes can also trigger inflammation. Here, the authors explain how inflammatory mechanisms are involved in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes and how this knowledge is directing immunomodulatory strategies for treating the disease.
Perspectives
Metabolism, migration and memory in cytotoxic T cells
David Finlay & Doreen A. Cantrell
doi:10.1038/nri2888
Nature Reviews Immunology, 11, 109-117 (2011)
In this Opinion article, David Finlay and Doreen Cantrell explore the molecular pathways that may link CD8+ T cell metabolism with effector versus memory CD8+ T cell differentiation through the control of T cell migration.
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