What is the function of lymph nodes?
Tuesday, May 26, 2009 - 12:07
in Biology & Nature
If we imagine our immune system to be a police force for our bodies, then previous work has suggested that the Lymph nodes would be the best candidate structures within the body to act as police stations – the regions in which the immune response is organised. However, Prof. Burkhard Becher, University of Zurich, suggests in a new paper – published in this week's issue of PLoS Biology – that lymph nodes are not essential in the mouse in marshalling T-cells (a main immune foot soldier) to respond to a breach of the skin barrier. This result is both surprising in itself, and suggests a novel function for the liver as an alternate site for T-cell activation.