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Mucosal immunology

Published on April 30, 2023   31 min

Other Talks in the Series: The Immune System - Key Concepts and Questions

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0:00
Hello. I'm Daniel Mucida from The Rockefeller University and from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. And the topic, today, of the class will be Mucosal Immunology. I just want to thank the people that did several of the slides I use throughout this talk, including Akiko Iwasaki and Ruslan Medzhitov from Yale University.
0:22
What I would like to cover with you today is a short overview of mucosal immunology. I will start by describing the mucosal surface, F_0 the main characteristics, and the microbiome composition. I will then discuss, briefly, about the mucosal-associated lymphoid tissues. Then I will describe the concept of resilience, which includes maintenance of homeostasis via resistance and tolerance. And then, about half of the presentation, I will give several examples of the research done in my laboratory that covers resistance to microbes, tolerance mechanisms, first including the classical immunological mucosal tolerance. And then, an example of disease tolerance via neuro-immune interactions in the intestine.
1:09
What are the mucosal surfaces?
1:13
These are epithelial surfaces composed of epithelial cells, which form a barrier between the external environment and the internal parts of the body. Among several functions, mucosal substances are responsible for nutrient absorption and secretion. Among several mucosal surfaces depicted here, you will notice that some, including the gut and the lung on the left side, contain a single-layered epithelium. While others, such as the oral cavity and ectocervix shown on the right side, are composed of several layers of stratified epithelial cells.