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Recent discovery broadens knowledge about the immune cells

2016-06-09

Peter Jönsson and collaborators have measured the interaction between protein molecules on the surface of contacting immune cells.

Peter Jönsson at the Division of Physical Chemistry, Lund University, has together with researchers at Oxford and Cambridge been the first to measure the affinity between the immune cell membrane proteins CD4 and MHC II. The strength of this interaction was shown to be at a level where the immune system can retain its sensitivity towards foreign agents while preventing it from starting an immune response towards our own cells. The experiments were performed both between CD4 and MHC II in solution, as well as in model systems where CD4 were binding to MHC II in contacting immune cells. The study was recently published in PNAS.