Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Systems biology approaches have revolutionized many fields, including immunology, but analysing and interpreting such large-scale datasets is challenging. Here, the authors describe a novel approach that has been developed to address this issue. It relies on the grouping of co-dependent genes into 'modules', which are then used to build 'fingerprints' that can simplify the analysis of large-scale datasets.
This Innovation article describes the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) methods for image-guided immune cell delivery and for the visualization of immune cell homing and engraftment, inflammation, cell physiology and gene expression.
New immunoimaging approaches that allow cell dynamics and function to be assessed simultaneously promise another decade of immunological insights in health and disease.
Using global profiling of gene and protein expression to derive models of regulatory networks in mammals poses many challenges. Here, the authors describe a systematic functional strategy to tackle these issues with a focus on its use in the immune system.
This Innovation article describes recently developed assays that measure the changing physiology within maturing phagosomes and discusses how studies using these techniques have shed light on the biological functions of phagosomes and phagocytes during innate and adaptive immune responses.
In this article, Margaret Harnett describes the technology of laser scanning cytometry and outlines the benefits of this technique in allowing the detection of signalling and functional events that occur during cell–cell interactionsin situ.
In this age of information, keeping up with the literature can be overwhelming for any researcher. The generation of the IEBD – the first epitope-related database that makes complex and context-dependent information on immune epitopes readily accessible and searchable – may help
Bioluminescence imaging is emerging as a useful tool for visualizing immune reactions. Importantly, this technique allows researchers to pinpoint the location of cells at numerous time points in intact animals. This is proving particularly useful in the study of graft-versus-host disease.