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WOMEN IN IMMUNOLOGY

Delphine Parrott, a pioneer of T cell biology

Nature Reviews Immunology volume 20, page 208 (2020)Cite this article

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Delphine M. V. Parrott (1928–2016) was one of the foremost woman scientists of her generation, being a pioneer of T cell immunology and mucosal immunology, as well as making seminal findings on lymphoid anatomy and lymphocyte recirculation.

Lymphocyte recirculation and anatomical niches within the immune system were to remain Delphine’s main focus for the rest of her career. After moving to the University of Glasgow in 1967, she and her trainees, who included Maria de Sousa, Marlene Rose, Antonio de Freitas, Anne Ferguson, David Bruce and Cliff Ottaway, defined the ground rules for the tissue-specific migration of T cells around the body. Together, they showed that activated T lymphoblasts ‘remembered’ their tissue of origin, for instance, migrating back to the intestine only if primed in intestine-draining lymph nodes in a process determined by non-antigen-specific factors. These insights remain fundamental to our understanding of lymphocyte trafficking, vaccine development and mucosal immunology. They led to Delphine developing a particular interest in intestinal immunology, which in the 1970s was a neglected area of research. She became a pioneer of this field, being one of the few people to focus on T cells and generating some of the first insights into the intraepithelial lymphocytes (IELs) found in the intestine. In particular, Delphine helped show that IELs were antigen dependent, capable of potent cytotoxic activity and linked with coeliac disease.

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References

Original articles

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  1. University of Glasgow, Scotland, UK

    Allan M. Mowat

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  1. Allan M. Mowat
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Correspondence to Allan M. Mowat.

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Mowat, A.M. Delphine Parrott, a pioneer of T cell biology. Nat Rev Immunol 20, 208 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41577-020-0292-7

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