Innate Immunity: From Louis Pasteur to Jules Hoffmann

by Yves Carton

Overview

Innate immunity is a new branch of immunology, confirmed by three Nobel Prize winners in 2011. It is the first line of defense against pathogens and is in a way the preliminary step of adaptive immunity which occurs later, and only present in vertebrates.

This book examines the way in which innate immunity was discovered in invertebrates. As a starting point, it looks at the work of Louis Pasteur on silkworm disease and the findings of Ilya Metchnikov, discoverer of phagocytosis. It also investigates André Paillot, who in 1920 demonstrated the existence of humoral immunity in insects, unrelated to the type of immunity that was initially thought to be present in all vertebrates.

Finally, Innate Immunity shows how the group directed by Jules Hoffmann found strong similarities between the innate immunity response of insects and mammals. The discovery of a receptor protein in Drosophila, which is also found in humans, was what led to Jules Hoffmann being awarded the Nobel Prize in 2011.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781785483080
Publisher:	Elsevier Science
Publication date:	11/15/2019
Pages:	324
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Yves Carton, immunology graduate of the Pasteur Institute, worked as a geneticist at the EGCE-CNRS laboratory (Gif-sur-Yvette and University Paris-Saclay, France) and is currently Emeritus Research Director at CNRS; Since few years, he has dedicated himself to the history of science, in particular the fields of entomology, biological control, Darwinism and immunology.

Table of Contents

1. Louis Pasteur and Silkworm Disease (1865–1870) 2. Ilya Metchnikov at the Pasteur Institute (1886–1916) 3. The Post-Metchnikov Era at the Pasteur Institute (1920–1940) 4. André Paillot against the “Phagocytic” Dogma: Humoral Immunity 5. The Crossing of the Desert for Invertebrate Immunity (1960–1990) 6. The Strasbourg Laboratory: Towards the Nobel Prize (2011)

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From the Publisher

Presents the transformations of the field of innate immunity on invertebrates, aiming to show the filiation of these results

Editorial Reviews

Reviewer: Richard F Coico, MS, PhD (SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University)
Description: This book describes how the field of innate immunity originated as early as 1865 when Louis Pasteur elegantly initiated efforts to understand the origins of disease associated with bacterial infections. At that time, the term innate immunity had not yet been coined; it took more than 100 years for Charles Janeway to come up with it in 1989. This book highlights pivotal benchmarks of discovery during that period and beyond with a focus on the evolution of knowledge in the scientific community to better define the critical role of innate immunity in immune defenses.
Purpose: The purpose is to provide a historical perspective of the evolution of knowledge regarding the innate immune system. The author shows us how the personalities of scientists as well as political and social factors influenced both theory and practice in the field we now call innate immunity. The author takes us back to the nineteenth-century contributions of Louis Pasteur that defined a rigorous approach to what was only approximately known at that time: how to investigate infections, contagions, and the genetics of diseases. Originally carried out using organisms with primitive innate immune systems (silkworm caterpillars), his work paved the way for generating knowledge about other animals and human pathology. The book then takes us through a chronological journey of scientific inquiry led by thought leaders in the field who focused on the cells, biochemistry, and, ultimately, molecular mechanisms that define the innate immune system. Along the way, the book highlights biological insights enabling us to appreciate the value of open-ended hypotheses as well as serendipity in scientific discovery.
Audience: Graduate students entering the fields of immunology, molecular biology, and other biomedical disciplines, as well as their instructors and mentors would benefit from this historical perspective of innate immunity. At a time when the life sciences are carried out using tools, reagents, and instruments often purchased from vendors, this book reminds us how fortunate we are compared to those who paved the way to modern science by creating from scratch most of the materials needed in their experiments and discoveries. The author is well positioned to teach us about the historical evolution of knowledge concerning the innate immune system. Throughout his distinguished career as an immunologist and graduate of the Pasteur Institute, he has dedicated himself to the history of the field of immunology.
Features: The book examines the experimental approaches and groundbreaking discoveries used by scientists over the past century to define cellular and biochemical mechanisms involved in this arm of the immune system. Using a historical approach for how this knowledge unfolded over time, the book describes how early discoveries using invertebrates, low resolution microscopes, and low-tech methods built the foundation upon which current molecular and structural biology approaches continue to expand our knowledge of innate immunity. The book is filled with examples of historic benchmarks that have contributed to our understanding of first-line host defense mechanisms that define innate immunity. For example, key concepts developed by Metchnikoff are summarized with relevant excerpts from his famous 1883 paper describing phagocytic cells involved in host defenses in frogs. Investigations carried out in the 1920s by Andre Paillot, who first demonstrated the existence of humoral immunity in insects, are also described. The author closes this historic perspective by matching these concepts with the challenges of modern immunology.
Assessment: This is a true resource for those interested in learning about the historic evolution of knowledge related to innate immunity and host defense mechanisms in general. There are other historical perspectives, including a well-received book by Arthur M. Silverstein, A History of Immunology, 2nd edition (Academic Press, 2009), but this book provides a comprehensive look back at the diverse experimental approaches used to study the immune system. It also includes photographs of the wide array of scientists who have made these significant contributions.

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