Wednesday 9 March 2016 at 10:00am

Title: “Mechanisms controlling cell migration and interaction in adaptive immune system”

Speaker:
Dr. Baubak Bajoghli, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany

Abstract:
The immune system of teleost fishes is comprised of most of the innate and adaptive components present in mammals. In terms of lymphoid tissues, despite having thymus, teleosts lack lymph nodes that are essential for adaptive immunity. The key to understanding the adaptive immune system in teleost fish is to define mechanisms regulating cell migration and interaction during development and immune response. The members of the chemokine superfamily serve a central function in these biological processes. We use zebrafish and medaka as model systems to understand how chemokine receptors and their counterpart ligands control cell migration during T cell development in the thymus. We have provided the first evidence that chemokines cooperate in guiding lymphoid precursors to settle in the thymus. Recently, we used in toto imaging of multiple transgenic reporters to study, for first time, how developing T cells migrate, interact and carry out their effector function within an intact thymus. Overall, we use combination of genomics, transcriptomics as well as advance genetic tools and in vivo imaging approaches to study how chemokine superfamily controls cell migration and interaction during development and initiation of adaptive immune system.

Host: Dr. Russell Hill, Ph.D.