Regulation of the adaptive immune response by chemokine scavenging receptors

当我们的身体受到细菌或病毒等外来生物的入侵时，我们就会产生所谓的免疫反应。这需要精心安排细胞在全身的运动，否则免疫反应将无法正常发展。免疫细胞的大部分运动是由称为趋化因子的特殊蛋白质调节的。我们就是用这些蛋白质来工作的。我们已经确定了一些分子，可以降解一些趋化因子，从而将它们从细胞周围的区域移除。我们相信这对免疫系统的正常工作很重要。目前的建议旨在更详细地研究这些我们称之为清道夫的分子，并仔细检查它们在帮助免疫反应发展中的作用。因此，我们产生的数据将帮助我们更详细地了解免疫反应的调节，并将对我们在治疗上操纵这一过程的能力产生影响。此外，有时趋化因子会发挥有害作用，可能是关节炎和牛皮癣等疾病的根本原因。我们相信，我们可能能够在疾病环境中使用这些清道夫分子来关闭炎症。因此，我们将根据我们对这些清除剂分子的了解，尝试开发抗炎剂，并将与一家大型制药公司合作，帮助开发它们的治疗潜力。

When our bodies are invaded by foreign organisms such as bacteria or viruses, we mount what is called an immune response. This requires the careful orchestration of cell movement throughout the body, without which the immune response would not be properly developed. Much of the movement of the immune cells is regulated by specialised proteins which are called Chemokines. It is with these proteins that we work. We have identified molecules that can degrade some of the chemokines and therefore remove them from the area surrounding cells. We believe that this is important for the proper working of the immune system. The current proposal aims to study these molecules, which we call scavengers, in much more detail and to carefully examine their roles in helping the development of immune responses. The data we generate will therefore help us to understand the regulation of the immune response in much more detail and will have implications for our ability to therapeutically manipulate this process. In addition, sometimes chemokines can play deleterious roles and can be at the root cause of diseases such as arthritis and psoriasis. We believe that we might be able to use these scavenger molecules in disease contexts to switch off inflammation. We will therefore try to develop anti-inflammatory agents based on our knowledge of these scavenger molecules and will partner with a large Pharmaceutical company to help develop their therapeutic potential.