Brooks Taylor/UCLA Life Sciences
In this image from a microscopy video, scientists “listen” to macrophages as they responded to an immune threat.
UCLA life scientists have identified six “words” that specific immune cells use to call up immune defense genes — an important step toward understanding the language the body uses to marshal responses to threats.
In addition, they discovered that the incorrect use of two of these words can activate the wrong genes, resulting in the autoimmune disease known as Sjögren’s syndrome. The research, conducted in mice, is published this week in the peer-reviewed journal Immunity (Cell Press).