ABOVE: This white rat received a donor leg from a brown rat along with microparticles that release a protein that trains the immune system to accept the foreign tissue.
UPMC
Getting any kind of transplant typically means taking multiple immune-suppressing drugs forever after to avoid rejection of the donor organ or tissue. A study published today (March 13) in Science Advances demonstrates a way around long-term immune suppression. The researchers injected microparticles that release a protein that recruits regulatory T cells to train the immune system of rats receiving a donor limb to recognize the foreign tissue as self instead of non-self.
The conventional immunosuppression strategy after transplantation comes with “a lot of side effects and complications down the line, but I think we’ve now realized that we need to shift this and this [study] is one testimony to this,” says Gerald Brandacher, a surgeon who specializes in upper extremity and ...
