Regional specification of oral mucosal immunity

摘要

In this issue of Science Immunology, Barreto de Albuquerque et al. track immune responsiveness to the foodborne pathogen Listeria monocytogenes during oral infection. Their findings extend the notion of compartmentalized immunity within the gastrointestinal tract to the oral cavity and provide previously unkown insights into regional specialization of oral immunity.The oral cavity is a site of first encounters. Food, airborne particles, and commensal bacteria and pathogens enter the gastrointestinal tract through the mouth. Yet, how microbes and other antigens are sensed and how local immunity is regulated is lessunderstood at this interface compared to other barrier surfaces (1). In this regard, the immunological mechanisms dictating tolerance to commensals or innocuous antigens and reactivity to pathogenic organisms at this mucosal surface are incompletely understood. Moreover, how oral immune responses to pathogens affect distal immune reactivity remains unclear.