Labor Gruppe Hopp

Labor Gruppe Hopp

The figure shows the central tolerance.

Overview

Plasmodium infection-induced perturbation of the B cell compartment of the bone marrow and its impact on malaria immunity

Many pathogens, such as Plasmodium, Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), HIV, Leishmania and Trypanosoma disseminate and persist in the bone marrow (BM). This poses a conundrum given our current understanding of central tolerance, according to which developing B lymphocytes that bind cognate antigen with high affinity in BM, are deleted from the lymphocyte repertoire or rendered anergic to prevent autoimmunity.

I plan to investigate whether pathogen presence in the BM drives negative selection or anergy in pathogen-specific developing lymphocytes. This would lead to tolerance to the pathogen and could contribute to inefficient acquisition of natural and vaccine-induced immunity that has been observed for many of the pathogens that persist in the BM.

Laborgruppe Hopp