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A study by the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC) provides new data on the activation of T lymphocytes, a type of white blood cells whose function is crucial for starting the body's immune response against pathogens. The investigation, which is published in the journal Nature Inmunology, reveals a new function of the immunological synapse in this activation process and confirms its importance in the articulation of the immune response.

The activation of T lymphocytes occurs in lymph nodes, regions throughout the human body, which is similar to the meeting points at airports or stations. They bet on other immune system cells of the human body, such as dendritic cells, which have previously engulfed microorganisms in the infection zone, then migrate to the lymph nodes and present antigens to T lymphocytes Through the lymph nodes, T lymphocytes continuously pass feel that dendritic cells to membrane receptors that recognize a TCR specific antigen, which comes from the area of infection, and is exposed on the dendritic cell. When this happens, the cell stops and form immunological synapse with a dendritic cell. This is a complex subcellular structure, formed in the area of interaction between T cells and dendritic cells, which keeps the two cells produced during cell activation. When it happens, the T cells proliferate and leave nodes to participate in the immune response.

So far, studies on the role of immunological synapses have focused on the cell and not on dendritic cells. This has been the role of researchers from the CSIC, in this work show that the immunological synapse plays an important role in regulating the survival of dendritic cells.

"Our work indicates that the immunological synapse transmitting intracellular signals that delay the apoptosis (programmed death) of the dendritic cell. The delay in apoptosis in this cell allows to carry out the activation of T lymphocytes is possible that this mechanism is essential to produce cell activation and, ultimately, to take place adequate adaptive immune response, "says José Luis Rodríguez-Fernandez, a researcher at the Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas (CSIC) in Madrid, which has addressed in this study have also helped researchers from the Center of Molecular Biology Severo Ochoa (CSIC).