Immunity and inflammation Flashcards
What are the different molecules that mediate immune responses?
- Complement- soluable serum proteins
- Cytokines and chemokines- messenger hormones
- Antibodies- secreted molecules which bind pathogens
What are the different types of leukocytes in the innate and adaptive immune processes?
Innate= macrophages, dendritic cells, neutrophils, eosinophils, basophils and mast cells
Adaptive= lymphocytes; B and T cells
What tissues are involved in immune response?
Lymphatics, lymph nodes, spleen, thymus and bone marrow
Where are immune cells made?
Bone marrow and thymus
Where do adaptive immune cells spend most of their time?
In lymph nodes and spleen
What is the name given to swelling of lymphatics during infection?
Lymphadenopathy
What are primary lymphoid organs?
Primary lymphoid organs are where immune cells are made
Immune cells made in bone marrow
T cells mature in the thymus
What are secondary lymphoid organs?
Secondary lymphoid organs are where immune responses are initiated
Lymph nodes and spleen
What do virally infected cells release?
Virally infected cells release IFN-alpha and IFN-beta (cytokines) which induce an antiviral state in neighbouring states.
What two things does the immune system need to recognise to produce an immune response?
Non-self and danger
What are the two types of danger signals?
PAMPS= pathogen associated molecular patterns. Molecules only produced by infectious agents e.g. bacterial wall constituents. Critial for survival of pathogen so cannot lose them
DAMPS= damage associated molecular patterns. Molecules released from injured cells such as DNA, RNA, ATP
What are the two types of cell death and what are their differences?
How does the innate immune system know what is a pathogen and what is not?
Pattern recognition receptors (PRR)
Recognise PAMPs and DAMPs.
They are mainly expressed by antigen presenting cells such as dendritic cells and macrophages, but they are also found in other immune and non-immune cells.
What is an example of pattern recognition receptors?
Toll-like receptors
TLR3 binds double stranded RNA from viruses
TLR4 binds bacterial cell wall
TLR5 binds flagellin
What immune response would stepping on a dirty nail cause?
Full immune response
What immune response would absorbing food molecules cause?
No immune response
What response would a clean scalpel cut cause?
Danger= yes
Non-self= no
Innate response only
What immune response would inhaling flu virus cause?
Full immune response
What are the main causes of cell injury?
- Lack of oxygen
- Physical agents such as temperature and radiation
- Chemicals and drugs
- Infectious agents
- Immune reactions
- Genetic defects
- Nutrition deficiency
How does apoptosis occur?
Apoptosis is usually part of a regulated process, and has been called ‘programmed cell death’ or ‘cell suicide’. It is a carefully regulated event, requiring energy from the dying cell, usually resulting in cell shrinkage and fragmentation. Phagocytosis of the resultant apoptotic bodies ensures there is no associated inflammation and bystander tissue damage.
What are caspases?
They cleave aspartate residue, chops up proteins.
Caspase 8 and 9 lead to the executioner caspases such as caspase 3. the caspases chop around all of the intracellular proteins. The nuclear material gets specifically chopped apart- DNA is cut apart between the histones. Very ordered
What is necrosis?
Uncontrolled cell death where the cell swells up, the membrane swells up and spillage occurs. Does not require energy to die.
What are the different types of necrosis?
- Coagulative
- Liquefactive
- Caseous
- Gangreous
What is coagulative necrosis?
big areas of tissue, no automatic cleanup. The structural proteins of the cells still remain but the nucleus and DNA has degraded. The proteins can glue together and coagulate
There is a ghost outline of cells
What is liquefactive necrosis?
Liquefactive= cell protein digested, loss of tissue architecture. There is infiltration by inflammatory cells (neutrophils)- causes pus. There can be a secondary infection by bacteria- wet gangrene. (can use the dead tissue to grow on)
What is caseous necrosis?
Granulomas ward off foreign bodies but they cannot degrade. When these collections get bigger and bigger, cells in the middle start to die off.
TB causes this
What are granulomas?
Large collections of macrophages,
What are the different types of phagocytes?
Neutrophils, macrophages and dendritic cells.
What is the complement system?
It is a cascade of soluble proteins and membrane expressed receptors and regulators, which operates in plasma, in tissues, on cell surface, and even within the cell.
It assists the immune system by releasing anaphylotoxins, causing opsonisation of pathogens and forming membrane attack complexes
What are the 3 different complement pathways?
- Classical
- Mannose-binding lectin
- alternative pathway
When does the classical complement pathway occur?
Only occurs when there are antibodies present specific to a foreign antigen. E.g. on a bacteria. Antibody complexes bound by complement component C1q which then triggers the cascade.
How is the mannose binding lectin complement pathway triggered?
Activation through mannose binding lectin binding mannose, or a similar carbohydrates on bacteria. Mannose is not present on the surface of host (human) cell.
How is the complement complement pathway triggered?
Most common pathway, based around complement component C3 which is spontaneously activating. When it activates it binds to nearby membrane. Host cells have control proteins on their surface to prevent further complement activation, whilst bacteria cells do not- thus is activates the complement.