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In this Review article, the authors describe the perinatal development of intestinal and respiratory mucosal immune systems. Moreover, they discuss how environmental factors, such as the neonatal composition of commensal bacteria, can affect the maturation of mucosal immune systems, leading to the development of chronic inflammatory disorders later in life.
Understanding the molecular events that orchestrate the formation of high-affinity memory B cells will help to improve vaccination strategies. In this Review article, McHeyzer-Williams and colleagues discuss the cellular and molecular interactions that regulate commitment to B cell memory, the germinal centre reaction and the generation of memory plasma cells following antigen recall.
In this short Perspective article, Glenn Dranoff summarizes the strengths and limitations of three of the most commonly used mouse tumour model systems for investigating host antitumour immune responses and the potential clinical efficacy of novel immunotherapies.
Cytotoxic T lymphocyte antigen 4 (CTLA4) has long been known to have an important regulatory role in the immune system; however, its mechanisms of action have been the subject of considerable debate. This article reviews the strengths and limitations of the cell-intrinsic and cell-extrinsic models that have been proposed to explain the function of CTLA4.
Using global profiling of gene and protein expression to derive models of regulatory networks in mammals poses many challenges. Here, the authors describe a systematic functional strategy to tackle these issues with a focus on its use in the immune system.
Infection, tissue injury and alterations in the composition of the microbiota have been implicated in the initiation of autoimmune diseases. In this Review article, Kingston Mills discusses how Toll-like receptor (TLR) signalling downstream of all these events can regulate the function of autoreactive T cells both directly and indirectly (through the activation of innate immune cells), and comments on the therapeutic implications of TLR targeting.