by La Jolla Institute for Immunology The chest of an adult, showing the location and size of the adult thymus. Credit: LearnAnatomy/Wikipedia/CC BY 3.0 Scientists at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) are investigating a talented type of T cell. Most T cells only work in the person who made them. Your T cells fight threats...
Abstract Superantigens (SAgs) are potent exotoxins secreted by Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pyogenes. They target a large fraction of T cell pools to set in motion a “cytokine storm” with severe and sometimes life-threatening consequences typically encountered in toxic shock syndrome (TSS). Given the rapidity with which TSS develops, designing timely and truly targeted therapies...
New research published in the May 2017 issue of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology provides another reason why smoking tobacco is harmful. In the report, researchers from Denmark show that smokers have reduced levels of mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells, a cell type involved in autoimmune diseases. Not only does this information shed more light on the...
