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The human condition: an immunological perspective

Nature Immunology volume 12, pages 369–372 (2011)Cite this article

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Despite enormous progress in basic research, there are many gaps in understanding human immunity. Here we describe how new investigational tools and computational methods promise to improve the diagnosis, prognosis and therapy of the many diseases with components from the immune system.

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Figure 1: The intertwined cycles involving hypothesis-driven research and systems-level analysis.

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Acknowledgements

Supported by the Intramural Research Programs of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious diseases and the National Human Genome Research Institute. The opinions expressed are solely those of the authors and do not reflect the official positions of the National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services or any other federal agency of the USA.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ronald N. Germain is with the Lymphocyte Biology Section, Laboratory of Immunology, the Program in Systems Immunology and Infectious Disease Modeling, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and the Trans-NIH Center for Human Immunology, Autoimmunity and Inflammation, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA.,

    Ronald N Germain

  2. Pamela L. Schwartzberg is with the Trans-NIH Center for Human Immunology, Autoimmunity and Inflammation and the Genetic Disease Research Branch, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA.,

    Pamela L Schwartzberg

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  1. Ronald N Germain
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  2. Pamela L Schwartzberg
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Correspondence to Ronald N Germain.

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Germain, R., Schwartzberg, P. The human condition: an immunological perspective. Nat Immunol 12, 369–372 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/ni0511-369

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