T cell development is a complex and tightly regulated process involving reciprocal interactions between the thymic stroma and differentiating thymocytes. Normal thymic function is critical for immunity and microenvironmental defects predispose to dysregulation in the T cell compartment. Thymic structure and function are also severely damaged by chemotherapy and pre-transplant conditioning. Furthermore, poor immune competence with ageing is closely linked to thymic atrophy. Overcoming such thymic defects would have immediate application in many diseases, especially the recovery of cancer patients from cytotoxic treatment. Reversing the thymus ageing process via inhibition of atrophic factors such as sex steroids or administration of thymopoietic growth factors is one possible approach. Moreover, it is becoming clear a common thymic epithelial progenitor exists, raising the possibility for de novo thymus generation using emerging stem cell and tissue engineering technologies. Achievement of this goal will open up many avenues for the application of thymus-based immune rejuvenation and manipulation.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.coph.2010.04.006 | DOI Listing |
J Affect Disord
January 2025
Service hospitalo-universitaire de psychiatrie générale et de réhabilitation psychosociale 29G01 et 29G02, ER 7479 SPURBO, CHRU de Brest, hôpital de Bohars, Brest, France.
Background And Hypothesis: The development of paraclinical tools to assist clinical assessment is already widespread in nearly all other medical specialties. In psychiatry, many efforts are being made to improve management strategies using these new techniques. The first episode psychosis (FEP) is a clinical entity whose evolution after onset is difficult to predict in the current state of our practices.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSci Immunol
January 2025
Laboratory of Molecular Immunology and Immunology Center, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health (NIH), Bethesda, MD 20892, USA.
Thymic stromal lymphopoietin (TSLP) is a type I cytokine that promotes allergic responses and mediates type 2 immunity. A balance between effector T cells (T), which drive the immune response, and regulatory T cells (T), which suppress the response, is required for proper immune homeostasis. Here, we report that TSLP differentially acts on T versus T to balance type 2 immunity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTransplantation
January 2025
Department of Surgery, Center for Transplantation Sciences, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA.
Background: Long-term renal allograft acceptance has been achieved in macaques using a transient mixed hematopoetic chimerism protocol, but similar regimens have proven unsuccessful in heart allograft recipients unless a kidney transplant was performed simultaneously. Here, we test whether a modified protocol based on targeting CD154, CD2, and CD28 is sufficient to prolong heart allograft acceptance or promote the expansion of regulatory T cells.
Methods: Eight macaques underwent heterotopic allo-heart transplantation from major histocompatibility complex-mismatched donors.
Am J Rhinol Allergy
January 2025
Division of Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
Background: Thymic stromal lymphopoietin (TSLP) plays an important role in mediating the type-2-inflammatory response. This study examined how TSLP and interleukin (IL)-4 levels in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps (CRSwNP) correlated with clinical and postoperative outcomes.
Methods: Solid-phase sandwich ELISA was used to analyze TSLP and IL-4 levels in mucus (n = 47), plasma (n = 17), polyp (n = 30), inferior (n = 25), and middle (n = 26) turbinate tissue collected during functional endoscopic sinus surgery (FESS) in CRSwNP patients (n = 76) and controls (n = 11).
Ann Thorac Surg Short Rep
December 2024
Interventional Radiology Service, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, New York.
Background: The study evaluated the safety and adequacy of percutaneous transsternal anterior mediastinal core biopsy.
Methods: All percutaneous computed tomography-guided transsternal mediastinal 18-gauge core biopsies performed at 2 academic centers were retrospectively reviewed. Procedural, clinical, and pathology data were recorded.
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