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NRI AT 20: REGULATORY T CELLS

FOXP3 as a master regulator of Treg cells

Nature Reviews Immunology volume 21, pages 618–619 (2021)Cite this article

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The mechanisms of immune tolerance have been one of the central questions in immunology. Tolerance was traditionally viewed as a recessive process, relying solely on clonal deletion and anergy of autoreactive cells. However, pioneering work in the late 1980s and 1990s by Shimon Sakaguchi, Don Mason, Fiona Powrie, Herman Waldmann, Nicole le Douarin, Juan Lafaille and others provided compelling evidence that immune tolerance is rather a dominant process, mediated by a subpopulation of CD4+ T cells with suppressive activity termed regulatory T (Treg) cells.

Nevertheless, at the dawn of the twenty-first century, there was still deep-rooted scepticism about Treg cells. Apart from the bitter memories from the suppressor T cell era, three unresolved fundamental questions underlay the scepticism. First, how can Treg cells be distinguished from other CD4+ T cells? The operational markers of Treg cells that were initially identified were shared with activated T cells and therefore lacked specificity. Second, what is the molecular basis of Treg cell development and function? Third, are Treg cells essential for immune tolerance? No autoimmune disease had been linked to defective Treg cell development or function.

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References

Original articles

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  • Ramsdell, F. & Ziegler, S. F. FOXP3 and scurfy: how it all began. Nat. Rev. Immunol. 14, 343–349 (2014)

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  1. Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan

    Shohei Hori

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  1. Shohei Hori
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Correspondence to Shohei Hori.

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Hori, S. FOXP3 as a master regulator of Treg cells. Nat Rev Immunol 21, 618–619 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41577-021-00598-9

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