Qualification goals:
In this seminar, students will receive an overview of the innate immune system. The emphasis is placed on understanding fundamental immune receptor families and their ability to recognize pathogens and trigger specific immune responses through signaling pathways. The course covers how immune cells distinguish between self and non-self, exploring the consequences when this discrimination is compromised. Additionally, discussions will address how our immune system distinguishes benign bacteria (such as gut microbiota) from true pathogens, exploring how the triggered immune response corresponds to the level of threat imposed by the microbe. Special attention will be given to species-specific differences of immune cells between mice and humans, along with the functional specializations of various innate immune cell types like macrophages, dendritic cells, and neutrophils. The seminar concludes with students having the opportunity to delve further into immunological concepts through a paper presentation on the final day of the course.


Contents:
- Fundamentals of the innate immune system
- Pattern recognition receptors and sensing of pathogens
- Immunological signaling pathways induce distinct immune responses
- Differentiation between self and non-self
- Autoimmune diseases
- Chronic infections
- Methods for investigating different immune responses (cytokines, signaling pathways, and cell death)
- Methods for generating and phenotyping of primary immune cells
- High-resolution fluorescence microscopy for the localization of immune receptors
- Real-time visualization of immune responses.

Dr. O. Majer: majer@mpiib-berlin.mpg.de close