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Article: Major immune system branch has hidden ability to learn.
- Article from:
- NewsRx Health
- Article date:
- February 15, 2009
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Half of the immune system has a hidden talent, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have discovered.
They found the innate immune system, long recognized as a specialist in rapidly and aggressively combating invaders, has cells that can learn from experience and fight better when called into battle a second time. Scientists previously thought any such ability was limited to the immune system's other major branch, the adaptive immune system.
The finding, published online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, will help scientists better understand the immune system and seek new ways to modulate ...