Abstract
Comparative immunology had its origin in the studies of inflammation by Elie Metchnikoff who proposed that the primary effectors of the immune response were circulating, amoeboid, phagocytic cells (Metchnikoff, 1891). In order to support this proposal, Metchnikoff reported that the bipinnaria larvae of a sea star would respond to physical injury (the introduction of rose prickles or glass rods into the larval blastocoel), to a normal infection by marine algae or to the artificial introduction of bacteria into the blastocoel with the encapsulation and phagocytosis of these foreign materials by accumulated amoeboid, phagocytic mesodermal cells. These studies were the first to demonstrate that echinoderms, and by inference according to Metchnikoff, all animals were capable of responding to inert substances, to injury and to foreign or pathogenic cells.
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