These tools will no longer be maintained as of December 31, 2024. Archived website can be found here. PubMed4Hh GitHub repository can be found here. Contact NLM Customer Service if you have questions.


Pubmed for Handhelds

PUBMED FOR HANDHELDS

Search MEDLINE/PubMed

  • Title: A unified theory of central tolerance in the thymus.
    Author: Liu YJ.
    Journal: Trends Immunol; 2006 May; 27(5):215-21. PubMed ID: 16580260.
    Abstract:
    Non-deletional tolerance resulting in the generation of regulatory T cells within the thymus is a key mechanism for the establishment of immunological self-tolerance. How the high-affinity self-reactive regulatory T cells escape negative selection and what type of antigen-presenting cells positively select them within the thymus are unsolved questions. Previous studies suggest that thymic epithelial cells are crucial for the positive selection of regulatory T cells in thymus. A recent study from my group shows that a subset of dendritic cells (that have been "educated" by the thymic stromal lymphopoietin molecule produced by a thymic cell type known as Hassall's corpuscles) positively select regulatory T cells within the medulla of human thymus. Here, I discuss the implications and historical context of this new result and suggest that a subset of mature dendritic cells within the thymic medulla protects the medium- to high-affinity self-reactive T cells from negative deletion and induces their differentiation into regulatory T cells in the thymus.
    [Abstract] [Full Text] [Related] [New Search]