Converting Effector T Cells into Regulatory T Cells

Slow progress is being made in the development of means to adjust the operation and configuration of the immune system, especially when it comes to damping inflammation. Present approaches used in the clinic are blunt, suppressing immune activity as a whole, or at least large swathes of it, and have significant side-effects. More sophisticated ways to adjust immune cell behavior may have applications in reducing some of the consequences of the disarray of the immune system that occurs with age. In particular, if the chronic inflammation and overactivity of the aged immune system could be reduced, some benefits might be realized. In the longer term, however, the real relevance of this sort of work is as a stepping stone towards a greater capacity to arbitrarily adjust the immune system in situ, changing or destroying very specific subpopulations of immune cells in order to achieve desired effects. It is possible that this could lead to the prevention of misconfiguration and change in relative numbers of immune cells that occurs with age. Scientists have revealed, for the first time, a method to reprogram specific T cells. More precisely, they discovered how to turn pro-inflammatory cells that boost the immune system into anti-inflammatory cells that suppress it, and vice versa. The researchers studied two types of cells called effector T cells, which activate the immune system to defend our body against different pathogens, and regulatory T cells, which help control t...
Source: Fight Aging! - Category: Research Authors: Tags: Daily News Source Type: blogs