Ectosomes as immunomodulators

Bacterial Peptides as Immunomodulators

Mucosal surfaces are habitats for the physiological microflora and are closely related to the mucosal immune compartment (mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue, MALT). Recently, considerable evidence has been accumulated showing that defined members of the physiological microflora express/liberate low molecular weight substances (peptides) which apparently are essential for the adequate immune resp...

Ectosomes

What are ectosomes? Ectosomes are vesicles of various size (0.1–1mm in diameter) that bud directly from the plasma membrane and are shed to the extracellular space. At variance with living cells, ectosomes have on their surface the phospholipid phosphatidylserine. These vesicles were long considered to be artefacts, and then they were confused with exosomes — the vesicles discharged upon exocyt...

Immunomodulators as an antimicrobial tool.

The spectrum of infectious diseases has shifted in the past 50 years to include those caused by microbes that cause disease predominantly in immunocompromised individuals. This phenomenon has underscored the dependence of microbial virulence on the immune status of the host. The limited efficacy of the available antimicrobial armamentarium in immunocompromised individuals, combined with increas...

Incretin hormones as immunomodulators of atherosclerosis

Atherosclerosis results from endothelial cell dysfunction and inflammatory processes affecting both macro- and microvasculature which are involved in vascular diabetic complications. Glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) is an incretin hormone responsible for amplification of insulin secretion when nutrients are given orally as opposed to intravenously and it retains its insulinotropic activity in pa...

Mesenchymal Stem Cells as Immunomodulators in Transplantation