immunology
10 stories tagged "immunology"
Lupus Hits Nine Women for Every Man, and the Reason May Be Hiding in DNA Both Sexes Share
Scientists sequenced more than 1.25 million immune cells and found over 1,000 genetic switches set differently in men and women, with the female side tuned for stronger inflammation. It may help explain why lupus hits nine women for every man.
Infectious DiseaseYour Antibodies Are Still Fighting the 2020 Virus
For two years the message was that another ancestral booster would keep pace with the virus. The immunology says the opposite can happen: repeated shots against the 2020 strain can lock your antibodies onto a version of SARS-CoV-2 that stopped circulating, and in 2023 the WHO named immune imprinting
Autoimmune & InflammationOne Protein Keeps Your Immune System's Peacekeeper Cells From Switching Sides
Regulatory T cells are supposed to be the immune system's off switch. Strip out a protein called TIF1γ and, under inflammation, they lose that identity, start producing an inflammatory cytokine, and join the attack.
Autoimmune & InflammationA Map of 1.1 Million Lung Immune Cells Finds the Genetic Risk for Autoimmune Disease in Tissue, Not Blood
Researchers at La Jolla mapped genetic activity in 1.1 million lung immune cells and found about 1,000 genes whose activity is tuned by disease-risk variants only inside tissue, plus 1,700 that read differently in women than in men.
Infectious DiseaseIn Tuberculosis, the Cell We Called 'Neutral' Is the One Torching the Lung
In the people whose latent TB roared into active disease, the airways filled with neutrophils, half of them flipping on an interferon alarm, while their T cells were pushed to exhaustion and death.
Autoimmune & InflammationThe Allergy Cell Everyone Wanted Dead Turns Out to Run Your Gut Lining and Your Metabolism
Eosinophils were the villain of asthma and allergy, the cell whole-body drugs are built to erase. A decade of tissue biology says they also seal your gut, feed your antibodies, and tune your fat, and the trials never measured any of it.
CancerPregnancy Stations Killer T Cells in the Milk Ducts, and a Decade Later They Haven't Left
Melbourne researchers found that pregnancy stations killer T cells in the milk ducts, where they persist for at least a decade and track with better breast cancer outcomes. Now the race is on to summon them with a hormone shot instead of a pregnancy.
Infectious DiseaseMost People's Bodies Quietly Beat TB. The Ones Who Lose Are Drowning Their Own T Cells.
A new single-cell study of the airways of TB-exposed people finds that progression to disease tracks with a neutrophil flood that smothers protective T cells, with type I interferon as the switch.
Infectious DiseaseThe textbook said B cells take turns. A new temporal map of a malaria infection says they don't.
A new Nature Immunology temporal map of B cell responses to malaria in mice catches class-switching, clonal expansion, and somatic hypermutation overlapping from the first week, scrambling the tidy stepwise story textbooks still teach.
Autoimmune & InflammationYour Thymus Quietly Stages a Lung. Researchers Just Named the Cell Playing the Part.
A new Nature Immunology study identifies an alveolar lung-like cell hiding inside the thymus, where it appears to teach the immune system not to attack your real lungs.