In this Perspective, Feuerer and colleagues consider how transposable elements (TEs) — which are mobile nucleic acid sequences in the genome — can impact diverse immune responses. For instance, transcription of TEs can activate innate immune pathways that generate type I interferons, TEs can regulate gene expression in immune cells and TEs could potentially be targeted to generate tumour neoantigens for immunotherapy purposes.
- Lisa Schmidleithner
- Philipp Stüve
- Markus Feuerer
