Two Sides of a Coin: The pro- and anti-inflammatory activities of IgG.

Immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies are an essential component of the immune system, allowing to generate immunological memory. In the form of self-reactive antibodies, however, IgG molecules can cause fatal organ inflammation, such as in SLE, neurodegenerative diseases or rheumatoid arthritis. On the other hand, the application of pooled serum IgG preparations of thousands of healthy donors (also referred to as intravenous immunoglobulin therapy) is able to inhibit autoantibody dependent inflammation, suggesting that IgG antibodies can also have an active anti-inflammatory activity. The talk will cover both aspects of IgG activity and discuss very recent findings of how IgG antibodies may trigger these opposing immune effector functions.

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From 19 Dec 2024 14:45
Until 19 Dec 2024 15:45
Location FSVMI building, seminar room

Speaker Falk Nimmerjahn
Affiliation Friedrich-Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuernberg
Host Bart Lambrecht

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About the speaker

Falk Nimmerjahn studied Biology at the Universities of Bayreuth and Erlangen in Germany. He did his PhD at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich after which he joined the laboratory of Jeff Ravetch at Rockefeller University in New York. At present he is the director of the Division of Genetics at the Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg and serves as the Vice Dean for Research. He has a long standing interest in understanding how Immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies, either as therapeutic IgG preparations or as self-destructive autoantibodies, mediate their activity in vivo. A special focus of his most recent research is to understand organ specific pathways of (auto)antibody activity and how different subsets of macrophages are contributing to IgG activity. Apart from classical inbred mouse model systems, he has developed state-of-the-art humanized mouse model systems allowing to understand human IgG activity in the setting of a human immune system. In addition to understanding human genetic factors impacting humoral tolerance his very recent work focuses on understanding human checkpoint control antibody activity in humanized mouse models.