10 - Sex Hormones, Pregnancy, and Immune Function

Abstract

The maintenance of health and disease development is critically dependent on the complex interplay between the endocrine, immune, and nervous systems. While it is well established that the glucocorticoid stress hormones have profound immunomodulatory effects, fewer studies have explored the influence of sex hormones on the immune system. An increasing body of evidence demonstrates that the mechanisms by which sex hormones modulate the immune response are markedly complex. The previous concept that sex hormones act exclusively through nuclear hormone receptors is expanded to include novel nonreceptor mechanism of sex hormone actions with membrane receptors, transcription factors, growth factors, and other hormones. Paradigms that had adequately explained how sex hormones influence adaptive immune responses in infectious and autoimmune disease are now being complicated by the ever expanding world of T-cell populations such as Th17 and regulatory T-cells. This chapter outlines the evidence by that sex hormones influence the immune response and explores the mechanisms by which sex hormones modulate the development of an immune response.