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New immune system discovered

(Medical Xpress)—A research team, led by Jeremy Barr, a biology post-doctoral fellow, unveils a new immune system that protects humans and animals from infection.

Immunology created May 20, 2013 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (30) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Excess dietary salt identified as autoimmune trigger

For the past few decades, health officials have been reporting increases in the incidence of autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis (MS). Now researchers at Yale School of Medicine, Harvard Medical ...

Medical research created Mar 06, 2013 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (16) | comments 11 | with audio podcast

Want tots without allergies? Try sucking on their pacifiers

(HealthDay)—A new Swedish study suggests that parents who want to protect their infants from developing allergies should try a simple approach to introducing their children to the wide world of microbes: ...

Immunology created May 06, 2013 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (13) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Team finds antibody that transforms bone marrow stem cells directly into brain cells

In a serendipitous discovery, scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have found a way to turn bone marrow stem cells directly into brain cells.

Medical research created Apr 22, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (11) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Scientists find underlying mechanisms behind chronic inflammation-associated diseases

(Medical Xpress)—Inflammatory response plays a major role in both health protection and disease generation. While the symptoms of disease-related inflammatory response have been know, scientists have not ...

Inflammatory disorders created Feb 23, 2013 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (10) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Engineered T cells kill tumors but spare normal tissue in an animal model

The need to distinguish between normal cells and tumor cells is a feature that has been long sought for most types of cancer drugs. Tumor antigens, unique proteins on the surface of a tumor, are potential targets for a normal ...

Cancer created Apr 07, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

New immune cells hint at eczema cause

(Medical Xpress)—University of Sydney researchers have discovered a new type of immune cell in skin that plays a role in fighting off parasitic invaders such as ticks, mites, and worms, and could be linked to eczema and ...

Immunology created Apr 22, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Do salamanders hold the solution to regeneration?

Salamanders' immune systems are key to their remarkable ability to regrow limbs, and could also underpin their ability to regenerate spinal cords, brain tissue and even parts of their hearts, scientists have ...

Medical research created May 20, 2013 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (7) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

Major health benefits of music uncovered

(Medical Xpress)—In the first large-scale review of 400 research papers in the neurochemistry of music, a team led by Prof. Daniel J. Levitin of McGill University's Psychology Dept. has been able to show ...

Psychology & Psychiatry created Mar 28, 2013 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (7) | comments 0

Study finds how to shutdown cancer's powerful master protein

The powerful master regulatory transcription factor called Bcl6 is key to the survival of a majority of aggressive lymphomas, which arise from the B-cells of the immune system. The protein has long been considered too complex ...

Immunology created Mar 03, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Gene discovery reveals importance of eating your greens

(Medical Xpress)—Eating your greens may be even more important that previously thought, with the discovery that an immune cell population essential for intestinal health could be controlled by leafy greens ...

Immunology created Mar 04, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

The brakes of inflammation

In the last few decades, sci­en­tists have come to attribute an immuno­log­ical expla­na­tion to many can­cers. It is now thought that tumors rise up rou­tinely in the body but that a healthy immune ...

Immunology created Feb 27, 2013 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (6) | comments 2

Scientists develop potential new treatment for autoimmune diseases

Scientists at Montana State University have developed a therapeutic that has potential as a biological drug or probiotic food product to combat many of the more than 80 autoimmune disorders that affect some 23.5 million people ...

Medical research created May 17, 2013 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (6) | comments 0

Ills of aging blood: Short-circuited stem cell programming linked to failing blood development

As blood stem cells age, changes in the epigenome—the system that regulates which genes are switched on and which are switched off throughout the body—alter these cells in ways that lead to reduced immune ...

Medical research created Feb 15, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Obesity makes fat cells act like they're infected

(Medical Xpress)—The inflammation of fat tissue is part of a spiraling series of events that leads to the development of type 2 diabetes in some obese people. But researchers have not understood what triggers ...

Medical research created Mar 05, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Immunity (medical)

Immunity is a biological term that describes a state of having sufficient biological defenses to avoid infection, disease, or other unwanted biological invasion. Immunity involves both specific and non-specific components. The non-specific components act either as barriers or as eliminators of wide range of pathogens irrespective of antigenic specificity. Other components of the immune system adapt themselves to each new disease encountered and are able to generate pathogen-specific immunity.

Adaptive immunity is often sub-divided into two major types depending on how the immunity was introduced. Naturally acquired immunity occurs through contact with a disease causing agent, when the contact was not deliberate, whereas artificially acquired immunity develops only through deliberate actions such as vaccination. Both naturally and artificially acquired immunity can be further subdivided depending on whether immunity is induced in the host or passively transferred from a immune host. Passive immunity is acquired through transfer of antibodies or activated T-cells from an immune host, and is short lived, usually lasts only a few months, whereas active immunity is induced in the host itself by antigen, and lasts much longer, sometimes life-long. The diagram below summarizes these divisions of immunity.

For more information about Immunity (medical), read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Related topics: immune system