Central tolerance: Learning self-control in the thymus

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

526 Scopus citations

Abstract

In the past few years, there has been a flurry of discoveries and advancements in our understanding of how the thymus prepares T cells to exist at peace in normal healthy tissue: that is, to be self-tolerant. In the thymus, one of the main mechanisms of T-cell central tolerance is clonal deletion, although the selection of regulatory T cells is also important and is gaining enormous interest. In this Review, we discuss the emerging consensus about which models of clonal deletion are most physiological, and we review recent data that define the molecular mechanisms of central tolerance.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)772-782
Number of pages11
JournalNature Reviews Immunology
Volume5
Issue number10
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 2005

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (United States) (to K.A.H.), and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research (Canada) (to T.A.B.).

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