Adriana Larregina, MD, PhD

1A) Generation of dendritic cell (DC) vaccines for tumours and infectious diseases: this sub-project uses passive transfer of human and mouse DC transduced in vitro to express transgenic Ag. It explores different factors involved in efficient expression and presentation of transgenic Ag by DC that signalled for efficient activation and immunostimulatory function.

1B) Skin genetic immunization: this sub-project studies expression of transgenic Ag ex-vivo and in vivo of mouse and human skin cells including skin resident DC after transfection with naked plasmid DNA combined with different adjuvants. Selection of adjuvants include: exogenous danger signals (such as Toll Like receptor agonists) and intrinsic danger signals such as pro-inflammatory cytokines and neuropeptides. The project studies their effect on dendritic cell activation and immunostimulatory function and the consequences in the outcome of the immune response.
 

2A) Study of DC migration out of skin and repopulation by DC precursors

2B) Study of the modulation of specific immune responses targeting skin Ag presenting cells: The main focus of the project is to understand the role of the skin microenvironment in modulating the function of resident DC. It analyzes the immunostimulator and tolerogenic functions of different populations of skin resident dendritic cells including Langerhans cells, dermal dendritic cells and CD14+ dendritic cell precursors.