Immunology

A review published in The Laryngoscope indicates that climate change’s effects on pollen seasons and concentrations are contributing to increasing rates of allergic rhinitis, or hay fever.

Why are older people more susceptible to infections than younger people? Why do vaccinations sometimes have less of an effect on them? In order to better understand the mechanisms of the aging immune system, the RESIST-Senior Individuals Cohort was set up as part of the Cluster of Excellence RESIST—a study with 550 citizens over the age of 60 and 100 younger participants aged between 20 and 40, all of whom come from the Hannover Region.

Most of the time, the intestinal immune system can recognize friend from foe, tolerating myriad foods while destroying disease-causing invaders. But for approximately 30 million Americans with food allergies—including 4 million children—immune cells mistakenly identify food as a threat, triggering potentially life-threatening reactions.

There is an urgent need for precision immunotherapy strategies that simultaneously target both tumor cells and immune cells to enhance treatment efficacy. Identifying genes with dual functions in both cancer and immune cells opens new possibilities for overcoming tumor resistance and improving patient survival.

A clinical team has spearheaded the use of CAR-T cell therapy for blood cancers. The researchers recently treated the first myeloma patient with this therapy, resulting in a very good response without severe complications. The expansion of this innovative treatment to myeloma patients offers new hope for those who have not responded to traditional treatment, marking a significant milestone in advancing health care in Hong Kong.

Rutgers Health researchers have discovered that networks of misplaced immune cells drive an aggressive lung disease, potentially opening a path to new treatments for a condition that kills 80% of patients within a decade.

A new study published in The Journal of Immunology reveals how a high-fat diet may impair the immune system’s ability to respond to infection by impacting the function of neutrophils, one of the first immune cells to respond to bacteria or viruses.

Antibodies, which recognize viruses and proteins that the body has encountered before, have long gotten most of the credit for giving the human immune system a memory. Now, researchers at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering have discovered a new form of immune memory.

A single molecular switch is essential for blood stem cells to enter an activated, regenerative state in which they produce new blood cells, according to a preclinical study led by Weill Cornell Medicine investigators. The discovery could lead to more effective bone marrow transplants and gene therapies.

New research suggests that receiving multiple doses of a vaccine in the same limb leads to faster antibody development, an important strategy for providing immunity as quickly as possible during a pandemic or disease outbreak.