Resistance to apoptosis in Fanconi's anaemia. An ex vivo study in peripheral blood mononuclear cells.

Fanconi's anaemia (FA) is a rare autosomal recessive disease characterised by progressive pancytopoenia, a diverse assortment of congenital malformations, an increased sensitivity to reactive oxygen species and a predisposition to the development of malignancies. In the present study, we assessed the propensity to undergo apoptosis of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from Italian FA patients. Cells were challenged by 2-deoxy-D-ribose (dRib) or TNF-alpha plus cycloheximide as agents that induce apoptosis by interfering with cell redox status and mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP), and PBMC from FA patients resulted to be less prone to die than those from healthy subjects.

Successful immunosenescence and the remodelling of immune responses with ageing.

In recent decades, major theoretical and technological advances have been achieved in the field of immunology. These have allowed the scientific community to analyse the immune system in a much more sophisticated manner than was possible even 20 years ago. Moreover, great theoretical changes have also occurred in gerontology-in particular, the hypothesis has been put forward that ageing and diseases are two different phenomena, and that successful ageing, i.