thegodofpleasure
Player in a Greek Tragedy
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- Matlock, Derbyshire, Uk
I came across this thanks to Dr Derya Unutmaz tweeting about work done by his friend and collaborator, Dr Stefan Feske.
http://nyulangone.org/press-releases/calcium-lets-t-cells-use-sugar-to-multiply-fight-infection
How relevant is this discovery to the work done by Don Staines & Sonya Marshall-Gradisnik, which showed impaired Calcium signalling in the T & B cells of ME/cfs patients ?
http://nyulangone.org/press-releases/calcium-lets-t-cells-use-sugar-to-multiply-fight-infection
A calcium signal controls whether immune cells can use the nutrients needed to fuel their multiplication into a cellular army designed to fight invading viruses. This is the finding of a study in human cells and mice led by researchers at NYU School of Medicine and published online October 10 in Immunity.
The study results concern the precise and massive immune counterattack by T cells in response to viral infection. When this type of white blood cell is turned on by an invader, it divides and multiples into an army of clones primed specifically to attack that invader.
The current study found that whether or not T cells can use energy from blood sugar, or glucose, to multiply depends on calcium flow into cells, a mechanism not previously recognized, say the authors.
Upon receiving the right signal—which in this case is the recognition of virus particles—T cells open channels in their outer membranes, letting calcium rush in to activate the protein NFAT, a transcription factor that turns on genes, say the researchers. Specifically, the new study shows that a particular type of calcium influx—store-operated calcium entry (SOCE)—controls the activation of NFAT and its ability to turn on genes that control the uptake and breakdown of glucose.
“Our results argue that SOCE, in cooperation with the enzyme calcineurin, regulates the conversion of glucose into cellular energy and building blocks needed for T cell proliferation,” says senior author Stefan Feske, MD, an associate professor in the Department of Pathology’s Experimental Pathology Research Laboratory at NYU School of Medicine.
How relevant is this discovery to the work done by Don Staines & Sonya Marshall-Gradisnik, which showed impaired Calcium signalling in the T & B cells of ME/cfs patients ?