Flipping the Script

To fight specific threats, the adaptive immune system mounts a sophisticated defence, picking up on pathogens’ markers, or antigens, to set up a targeted response against them. Immune cells known as dendritic cells play an important role here: they display antigens to activate T cells, which then destroy anything they recognise as the same pathogen. Recent research on especially effective T-cell activators, type 1 conventional dendritic cells (cDC1s), found that a protein regulating the expression of other genes, the transcription factor DC-SCRIPT, was essential for their immune performance. cDC1s developing without DC-SCRIPT (highlighted in cDC1s in red, beside T cells in blue) were less able to properly interact with antigens, damaging their effectiveness against disease. As our understanding of dendritic cell development grows, researchers hope to find ways of stimulating the production of larger numbers of functional dendritic cells, to ultimately boost the body’s own defences against viruses or cancer.

Written by Emmanuelle Briolat

Emmanuelle Briolat

Writer

A researcher specialising in visual signals in Lepidoptera, camouflage and the effects of light pollution, Emmanuelle’s writing covers a range of topics, from biomedical research to children’s books about moth defences.

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• Image by Shengbo Zhang and Wang Cao, WEHI
• Walter and Eliza Hall Institute (WEHI) of Medical Research, Parkville, VIC, Australia
• Image copyright held by the original authors
• Research published in Science Immunology, April 2021