Medical research

Immune cells help older muscles heal like new

Biomedical engineers at Duke University have found a critical component for growing self-healing muscle tissues from adult muscle—the immune system. The discovery in mice is expected to play an important role in studying ...

Oncology & Cancer

New cancer immunotherapy shows promise in early tests

Much cancer immunotherapy research has focused on harnessing the immune system's T cells to fight tumors, "but we knew that other types of immune cells could be important in fighting cancer too," says Ashish Kulkarni at the ...

Immunology

Second 'don't eat me' signal found on cancer cells

A second biological pathway that signals immune cells not to engulf and kill cancer cells has been identified by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

Medical research

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 found.

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Macrophage

Macrophages (Greek: big eaters, from makros "large" + phagein "eat"; abbr. ) are white blood cells within tissues, produced by the division of monocytes. Human macrophages are about 21 micrometres in diameter. Monocytes and macrophages are phagocytes, acting in both non-specific defense (or innate immunity) as well as to help initiate specific defense mechanisms (or adaptive immunity) of vertebrate animals. Their role is to phagocytose (engulf and then digest) cellular debris and pathogens either as stationary or as mobile cells, and to stimulate lymphocytes and other immune cells to respond to the pathogen. They can be identified by specific expression of a number of proteins including CD14, CD11b, F4/80 (mice)/EMR1 (human), Lysozyme M, MAC-1/MAC-3 and CD68 by flow cytometry or immunohistochemical staining. They move by action of Amoeboid movement.

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