Studying the mechanisms of human immunity and developing cancer immunotherapies.
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Studying the mechanisms of human immunity and developing cancer immunotherapies.
The overarching theme of the Palucka lab is to investigate the mechanisms of human immunity and to identify strategies for harnessing the power of the immune system to prevent and treat cancer.
A central focus is on immune-based therapeutics for cancer, a highly attractive option owing to three cardinal features of the immune system: the mobility of immune effector cells, which enable them to traffic to cancer sites and sense even residual disease; the specificity of immune effector cells, which thereby limits treatment toxicity and off-target effects; and the memory of immune cells for their targets, which endows them with the ability to recognize and prevent metastasis.
Dendritic cells (DCs) play a crucial role in priming T cell–driven antiviral responses. Silvin et al. have examined the paradox of how virus-infected DCs retain the ability to drive adaptive immune responses. In response to endocytic viruses, they found CD1c+ DCs to be susceptible to infection and death, whereas CD141+ DCs were not.
They report that viral resistance of CD141+ DCs was conferred by the expression of an endocytic guanosine triphosphatase, RAB15, and that transfer of antigen from infected CD1c+ DCs by CD141+DCs allowed these virus-resistant DCs to prime T cell responses.
By documenting a division of labor between DC subsets that separates antigen acquisition from antigen presentation, Silvin et al. offer a solution to this long-standing puzzle.