Abstract
Professional “antigen presenting cells” represent a cellular group, belonging to our innate immune system, specialized in phagocytizing or pinocytizing microorganisms, hydrolyzing them into small molecular fragments and incorporating them into their corresponding antigen presenting molecules. This combination of APC is principally made up of precursors in the bone marrow, peripheral circulating blood monocytes, macrophages in the tissues, B cells, dendritic cells and Langerhans cells in practically all the tissues in our body. Each one of these types of cells is specialized in capturing, processing and presenting different types of antigens. By class II histocompatibility molecules, they are capable of presenting small peptidic fragments to the conventional T cells, while by presenting molecules such as the CD1, they are capable of presenting small lipidic fragments to the NKT lymphocytes. In this chapter, we are going to focus on the study of the monocytes, macrophages and dendritic cells and the advance experienced in recent years in the study of the subpopulations they make up. We will also address the relevant role of monocytes in inflammation and the destruction of pathogens and the role of dendritic cells as a link between the adaptive and innate immunity, taking charge of initiating the activation of the novel T cells.
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