Over the last decade intense investigation of CD4 and CD8 T cells have revealed subsets
that can be identified by their distinct patterns of cytokine production, phenotypes and function
that develop their unique features as a consequence of cytokine and T cell receptor signals during interaction with antigen-presenting cells.
This understanding and research still ongoing has and will lead to an appreciation of the extremely broad diversity of T cells that perform myriad critical functions in immunity and contribute to immunopathology.
One aspect of the heterogeneity of T cells that has received somewhat less analysis is the fact that effector T cells that develop in or migrate to different organs and to tissue sites of infection are very different from one another in their phenotypes, cytokine polarization and function. Major questions include:
1) How does the organ and tissue specificity arise?
2) What are the characteristics of effectors in different sites and how
do they contribute to immunity?
3) To what extent does their specialization dictate their protective and
deleterious functions?
4) Are the memory cells that develop from specialized effectors also
specialized and do they remain in the same site?
5) Do B cells display an equivalent heterogeneity and what are its most
salient characteristics?
By drawing together the newest investigations into this topic we hope to
gain deeper insights into how the immune system components are
Integrated to provide optimum immunity to the wide variety of pathogens that
threaten us.
Over the last decade intense investigation of CD4 and CD8 T cells have revealed subsets
that can be identified by their distinct patterns of cytokine production, phenotypes and function
that develop their unique features as a consequence of cytokine and T cell receptor signals during interaction with antigen-presenting cells.
This understanding and research still ongoing has and will lead to an appreciation of the extremely broad diversity of T cells that perform myriad critical functions in immunity and contribute to immunopathology.
One aspect of the heterogeneity of T cells that has received somewhat less analysis is the fact that effector T cells that develop in or migrate to different organs and to tissue sites of infection are very different from one another in their phenotypes, cytokine polarization and function. Major questions include:
1) How does the organ and tissue specificity arise?
2) What are the characteristics of effectors in different sites and how
do they contribute to immunity?
3) To what extent does their specialization dictate their protective and
deleterious functions?
4) Are the memory cells that develop from specialized effectors also
specialized and do they remain in the same site?
5) Do B cells display an equivalent heterogeneity and what are its most
salient characteristics?
By drawing together the newest investigations into this topic we hope to
gain deeper insights into how the immune system components are
Integrated to provide optimum immunity to the wide variety of pathogens that
threaten us.
