Innate immune cells articles from across Nature Portfolio

Fibroblasts and macrophages have classically been viewed as engaging in a one-way supportive relationship in which fibroblasts sustain macrophage survival. Emerging evidence now challenges this paradigm by demonstrating a bidirectional regulatory circuit in which macrophages actively restrain fibroblast activation to preserve tissue integrity.

T cell immunoglobulin and mucin domain-containing protein 3 (TIM-3) is a protein that has been associated with regulatory processes in different immune cells. Here the authors demonstrate that TIM-3 is associated with regulation of type 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2) and use two different mouse allergy models to show how signalling through TIM-3 reduces allergic responses and inflammation.

You, Hu et al. discover a population of COTL1^high NK cells regulated by GITRL⁺ macrophages and demonstrate their functional importance in mediating anti-tumour immunity in cancer with impaired tumour-specific MHC-I expression.

In this study, the authors identify an Aurka–Bhlhe41 axis, which prevents microglia from aging-like dysfunction by limiting CD22 upregulation, preserving myelin debris clearance and remyelination, and highlighting a potential therapy target for neurodegeneration.

A preprint by Ma et al. reports that the Fc receptor CD16a is a mechanosensitive receptor that helps natural killer cells to discriminate between cell-bound antibodies and soluble immune complexes.

A previously unappreciated sympathetic–immune axis links psychological stress to eosinophil recruitment and consequent worsening of atopic dermatitis.

Early life exposure to allergens triggers a unique mode of dendritic cell activation in the skin, inducing local inflammation and priming systemic allergic responses to subsequent exposures in later life.

Fibroblasts and macrophages have classically been viewed as engaging in a one-way supportive relationship in which fibroblasts sustain macrophage survival. Emerging evidence now challenges this paradigm by demonstrating a bidirectional regulatory circuit in which macrophages actively restrain fibroblast activation to preserve tissue integrity.