Immunology of Diseases

The battle between pathogens and the host immune defenses has raged for thousands of years. The immune system has developed a variety of approaches to controlling viral and bacterial infection, which range from direct killing of pathogen to elaborating cytokines that inhibit replication. Pathogens have countered by developing a variety of immune evasion mechanisms. So there is a critical need for new technologies in clinical microbiology, particularly for bloodstream infections, in which associated mortality is among the highest of all infections.

  • Type II secretion system
  • Type III secretion system
  • Intracellular pathogenesis
  • Biofilms
  • Antigenic variation