Your Amazing Immune System
Coughing, sneezing, and blinking are considered as providing a type of barrier that is part of your innate immunity.
What is a mechanical barrier?
What is innate immunity?
This type of molecule plays a role in the inhibition of T-cell immune responses. Common ligands are CTLA-4 and PD-L1.
This is the process by which the immune system identifies cancerous or precancerous cells and eliminates them before they become clinical.
What is immune surveillance?
The type of immunotherapy is administered prior to the growth of cancer to create memory of the immune system, giving the patient long-term immunity to a specific cancer.
What is a vaccine?
By eliminating dead or damaged cells and initiating tissue repair, the immune system plays a role in this body function.
What is homeostasis?
This type of immunity is characterized by the production of antibodies or immunoglobulins. Cells commonly associated with this type of immunity include plasma cells and B lymphocytes.
What is humoral immunity?
This protein found on T-cells has an inhibitory function that, when bound to its corresponding ligand, inhibits T-cell proliferation and cytotoxic function. This protein has far-reaching implications in the treatment of many types of cancers.
What is PD-1?
The 3 phases of this process include elimination, equilibrium, and escape.
What is immunoediting?
This type of immunotherapy is a lab-produced protein that is made to act like a human antibody. It may be made from murine proteins, human proteins, or somewhere in between.
What is a monoclonal antibody?
This is the main site for lymphocyte development and differentiation.
What is the bone marrow?
This type of immunity involves cytotoxic and helper T-cells.
What is cell-mediated immunity?
This enzyme is an important mediator of signaling cascades in cells. Its overexpression or mutation may lead to the formation of cancer. Common types include EGFR and BCR-ABL.
What is a tyrosine kinase?
This group of intracellular molecules are capable of being recognized by T-cells. Loss or alteration of this component allows a tumor to evade immune response.
What is major histocompatibility complex (MHC)?
This type of immunotherapy helps regulate T-cell function to make tumor cells visible to the patient’s immune system.
What are immune checkpoint inhibitors?
This is the body's first line of defense against pathogens. It is essential to produce a nonspecific response to a pathogen or foreign substance.
What is innate immunity?
This type of immune cell is cytotoxic to tumor cells and self-cells that are infected with a virus. They do not require a specific antigen to act.
What are natural killer (NK) cells?
This type of glycoprotein is produced in response to T-cell activation and itself is not generally considered cytotoxic. Common types of this protein are interleukins and interferon.
What is a cytokine?
During this phase, tumor cells are kept in check by the immune system but are not destroyed.
What is equilibrium?
This type of immunotherapy uses lab-modified living immune cells (often harvested from the patient) to trigger an immune response to a cancer cell. One example of this is CAR-T therapy.
What is adoptive cell transfer?
This begins when tumor antigens are recognized by antigen presenting cells (dendritic cells or macrophages) that present tumor antigens to the immune system, stimulating the priming and activation of appropriate immune cells. Activated immune cells are then directed to tumor sites, infiltrate the tumor, and kill cancer cells.
What is the cancer-immunity cycle?
Immune cells that are part of this line include multiple types of T-cells: helper, cytotoxic, memory, and regulator/suppressor cells.
What are lymphoid cells?
This signaling pathway has extracellular, transmembrane, and intracellular components. Mutations here result in unregulated cell growth in the absence of appropriate extracellular signals.
What is EGFR?
Tumor cells may fail to give off this type of signal that would normally elicit an immune response. This failure allows tumor cells to grow unchecked.
What is an inflammatory signal?
This type of immunotherapy produces a general immune response that activates a wide variety of immune cells. Drugs in this category include interferons and colony-stimulating factors.
What are cytokines?