Control of immediate hypersensitivity responses in parasitic and other diseases

高嗜酸性粒细胞增多症已经得到了广泛的研究，我们已经确定了区分这种综合征的几个重要变体的新标记物。 利用流行病学工具，结合过敏性疾病的生理测量和免疫学评估，研究了蠕虫感染和过敏性疾病之间的相互作用。我们已经证明，慢性蠕虫感染可以预防过敏性疾病。到目前为止的研究已经证明，在慢性丝虫感染中，CD4+细胞(既不是单核细胞，也不是嗜碱性粒细胞)是IL-10的压倒性主要来源。 我们已经开发了定量方法来检查每种抗体同种类型的生殖系转录，并开始使用这些方法来检查当抗原诱导特定开关重组事件时发生的分子事件。此外，还检测了过敏和寄生虫感染患者的基线IgE和IgG4生殖系转录谱，以及相关的IgE和IgG4水平升高。 对可能与空气变应原发生交叉反应的寄生虫变应原进行了详尽的搜索。我们已经鉴定了一些寄生虫抗原和过敏原同源物，并研究了对它们的IgE和Ig G反应。我们已经明确地证明，寄生虫感染诱导了寄生虫特异性IgE和与寄生虫抗原密切相关的环境过敏原相互作用的IgE。

Hypereosinophilic conditions have been studied extensively, and we have identified new markers that distinguish among several important variants of this syndrome. The interaction between helminth infeciton and allergic disease has been studied using epidemiological tools coupled with physiological measurements of allergic disease and immunological assessments. We have demonstrated that chronic helminth infection protects against allergic diseases. Studies done to date have demonstrated the CD4+ cells (and neither the monocytes nor the basophils) are the overwhelmingly major source of IL-10 in chronic filarial infection. We have developed quantitative methods for examination of germline transcription for each of the antibody isotypes and have begun to use these methods to examine the molecular events that occur when antigens induce specific switch recombination events. Also baseline IgE and IgG4 germline transcription profiles have been measured in patients with allergic and parasitic infections and associated elevations of IgE and IgG4. An exhaustive search for parasite allergens that may cross-react with aeroallergens has been performed. We have identified a number of parasite antigens and the allergens orthologues and have studied the IgE and IgG responses to these. We have demonstrated unequivocally that parasite infections induced both parasite-specific IgE and IgE that interacts with enviromental allergens to which the parasite antigens are closely related.