Guest:

Professor Matteo Iannacone is Director of the Division of Immunology, Transplantation and Infectious Diseases, Professor of Pathology, and Head of the Dynamics of Immune Responses laboratory at Vita-Salute San Raffaele University. His work centers on understanding the generation of dysfunctional adaptive immune cells in chronic hepatitis B virus infection and developing new strategies to reprogram them into functional cells endowed with potent antiviral activity.

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The Immunology Science Round Up

The Cells That Keep Immunity in Check – Brenda reviews Dr. Shimon Sakaguchi’s seminal study demonstrating that a population of T cells expressing the IL-2 receptor α chain acts to maintain self-tolerance by suppressing other T cells.

The Gene That Controls Immune Balance – Brenda reviews Dr. Mary Brunkow and Dr. Fred Ramsdell’s work identifying FOXP3 as the gene disrupted in a fatal lymphoproliferation syndrome in the “scurfy” mouse, pointing to FOXP3 as a master regulator of regulatory T cells.

Zap70 and the T_reg Cell Repertoire – Age-dependent Zap70 expression regulates negative selection and thymic T_reg cell development.

T Cell Exhaustion Driven by Protein Stress – Researchers show that proteotoxic stress, induced by protein aggregation, is not merely a consequence, but a driver of the exhausted T cell state.

Image courtesy of Professor Matteo Iannacone.