Signaling and the immunological synapse

This chapter deals with T cell activation and immunological synapses. It begins with a brief summary of T cell biology to put a discussion of immune synapses into a broader context because the study of immunological synapses addresses issues pertaining mainly to the field of cellular immunology. It explores questions such as the mechanism by which the T cell recognizes antigens with high sensitivity and specificity, and these signals are modulated to mediate such diverse processes as T cell development, T cell survival, and T cell effector functions. In this regard, it presents new approaches that incorporate principles of biochemistry, cell biology, immunology, and systems biology. Recent work using state of the art methods of digital imaging have revealed a process of membrane protein rearrangement known as immunological synapse formation. Immunological synapse formation is intimately associated with the T cell activation process. This chapter reviews recent progress in this field. The immunological synapse is a specific arrangement of proteins in the contact area. Many different patterns of the immunological synapse have been discovered, and it is suggested that these patterns are related to the biological outcome of T cell activation. It seems likely, given the rapid progress in this field, that much more would be known about immunological synapses in the very near future. © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.