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The many important facets of T-cell repertoire diversity

Janko Nikolich-Zugich1, Mark K Slifka, Ilhem Messaoudi

  • 1Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute, Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology and the Oregon National Primate Research Center, Oregon Health and Science University, Beaverton, Oregon 97006, USA. nikolich@ohsu.edu

Nature Reviews. Immunology
|March 26, 2004
PubMed

In the thymus, a diverse and polymorphic T-cell repertoire is generated by random recombination of discrete T-cell receptor (TCR)-alphabeta gene segments. This repertoire is then shaped by intrathymic selection events to generate a peripheral T-cell pool of self-MHC restricted, non-autoaggressive T cells. It has long been postulated that some optimal level of TCR diversity allows efficient protection against pathogens. This article focuses on several recent advances that address the required diversity for the generation of an optimal immune response.

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