{"id":28928,"date":"2025-10-08T12:27:19","date_gmt":"2025-10-08T10:27:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/opentalk.iit.it\/?p=28928"},"modified":"2025-10-14T12:02:40","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T10:02:40","slug":"the-nobel-prize-in-medicine-2025-t-cells-and-the-balance-of-immune-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/opentalk.iit.it\/en\/the-nobel-prize-in-medicine-2025-t-cells-and-the-balance-of-immune-system\/","title":{"rendered":"The Nobel Prize in Medicine 2025 \u2013 T cells and the balance of immune system"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

By Velia Siciliano, PI of Synthetic and Systems Biology for Biomedicine Lab, IIT<\/span><\/em><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

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How does the body know what is safe, when to defend? How does it know when to stop once the attack has mounted?<\/span> In a healthy immune system, balance is everything. <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The body must attack pathogens yet avoid turning its weapons against itself. This delicate equilibrium depends on\u00a0<\/span>regulatory T cells (Tregs)<\/strong>,<\/b> a specialized subset of T immune cells that suppress excessive or misdirected immune responses. T cells are named with a T, because they mature in the thymus gland. Without them, the immune system\u2019s brakes fail, leading to\u00a0<\/span>autoimmune diseases<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>such as type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and IPEX syndrome (a genetic condition where the immune system attacks its own body organs).<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The existence of these \u201cpeacekeeping\u201d cells was first uncovered by\u00a0<\/span>Shimon Sakaguchi<\/strong>, who showed that removing a small subset of T cells caused catastrophic autoimmunity in mice.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

His work showed that the immune system has active self-regulation mechanisms even outside the thymus, preventing immune cells from attacking the body\u2019s own tissues. This discovery revolutionized the understanding of immune tolerance and, as a result, reshaped the entire field of immunology.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Years later,\u00a0<\/span>Mary E. Brunkow<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>and\u00a0<\/span>Fred Ramsdell<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>identified the missing genetic piece:\u00a0<\/span>FOXP3<\/strong>, a transcription factor whose mutation caused the fatal\u00a0<\/span>IPEX syndrome<\/strong>. Their discoveries demonstrated that FOXP3 is the master regulator of Treg development and function, the molecular signature of the immune system\u2019s restraining arm.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Together, Sakaguchi\u2019s identification of Tregs and Brunkow and Ramsdell\u2019s elucidation of FOXP3 formed the foundation of modern immune tolerance research, t<\/span>he branch that studies the ability of the immune system to recognize the body\u2019s own cells and tissues as \u201cself\u201d and therefore not attack them<\/span>. Their collective work not only explained why autoimmunity occurs when regulation fails, but also opened new therapeutic frontiers, from restoring tolerance in autoimmune disorders and transplants to modulating it in cancer immunotherapy.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Today, that insight underpins a new generation of\u00a0<\/span>cell therapies<\/strong>. By isolating and expanding a patient\u2019s own Tregs, or even engineering them with specific antigen receptors, scientists can selectively\u00a0<\/span>turn down harmful immune responses<\/strong>, offering hope for autoimmune diseases, organ transplants, and inflammatory disorders. Conversely, in cancer or chronic infection, where the immune system becomes overly restrained, the same pathways explain\u00a0<\/span>T-cell exhaustion<\/strong>, a state of dysfunction driven by persistent suppression.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
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Thus, the molecular logic uncovered by these three laureates bridges basic immunology and modern medicine: understanding how to\u00a0<\/b><\/span>apply the immune system\u2019s brakes or release them<\/strong>\u00a0<\/b><\/span>now defines some of the most promising frontiers in therapy.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Velia Siciliano, PI of Synthetic and Systems Biology for Biomedicine Lab, IIT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":28925,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5039],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28928","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Nobel Prize in Medicine 2025 \u2013 T cells and the balance of immune system - Talk iit<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/opentalk.iit.it\/en\/the-nobel-prize-in-medicine-2025-t-cells-and-the-balance-of-immune-system\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Nobel Prize in Medicine 2025 \u2013 T cells and the balance of immune system - 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