MELBOURNE, Jan. 17 (Xinhua) -- An international team of scientists has discovered a new way immune cells recognize molecules in the body, challenging a long-standing view of how the immune system works.
The study, published in Nature Communications, found that a key molecule called CD1c can show lipid antigens to T cells in a sideways position instead of the upright arrangement scientists believed to be standard for more than 30 years, said a statement from Australia's Monash University on Friday.
Researchers from Monash University's Biomedicine Discovery Institute (BDI) and the Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital in the United States used advanced imaging, including data from the Australian Synchrotron, to reveal that CD1c can hold and display multiple lipid molecules at the same time.
The finding shows that immune recognition is more flexible than previously thought, helping explain how the body's defense system detects a wide variety of lipid molecules found in human tissues.
"There are additional ways immune cells can 'see' what's around them," said Adam Shahine, a National Health and Medical Research Council research fellow at Monash BDI.
However, "much of immunology has been built around the idea that immune recognition follows one fixed arrangement," Shahine said.
Lipids are abundant throughout the body and play important roles in normal physiology and disease, the statement said, adding that understanding how the immune system recognizes these molecules is essential for building a more complete picture of immune function.
Scientists said this new understanding could support research into diseases where lipids play a role, leading to new strategies for diagnostics and targeted therapies. ■
