compassion is a complex process that is innate, determined in part by individual traits, and modulated by a myriad of conscious and unconscious factors, immediate context, social structures and expectations, and organizational “culture.” compassion is an ethical foundation of healthcare and a widely shared value; it is not an optional luxury in the healing process. while the interrelations betw...

Natural killer (NK) cells are effector cells of the innate immune system that exert direct cytotoxic functions. Ubiquitously-expressed toll-like receptors (TLRs) have been recognized as one of the major components promoting dendritic cell (DC) maturation, which may induce polarized immune responses beneficial to cancer immunotherapy. TLR-activated NK cells and DCs are prerequisite for robust ac...

From the discovery of antibodies in the late nineteenth century until very recently, the focus of most research in immunology has been the so-called adaptive immune response. Adaptive immune responses are highly specific for a given microorganism and it is the T and B lymphocytes of the adaptive immune response, and the antibodies produced by the B lymphocytes, that are responsible for lasting ...

[This corrects the article on p. 486 in vol. 5, PMID: 25346734.].

Spinning septins S eptin fi laments in yeast do a right-angled turn in the middle of cell division, according to Alina Vrabioiu and Tim Mitchison (Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA). The fi laments initially align parallel to the spindle axis but then rotate 90° to form two circumferential rings that fl ank the cytokinetic furrow. Septin fi laments help cells divide, but just how they do so ha...