Preface

摘要

Since first observed by Wharton Jones in 1846 and named by Paul Ehrlich in 1879, the eosinophil has been the subject of extensive investigation in such eosinophil-related conditions as allergy and parasite infection. Eosinophils are now recognized to play a role in health and disease, with a functional diversity due to multifaceted biological properties. Recent studies have driven dramatic progress in understanding the pathogenesis of, and developing therapeutics for allergic diseases from the aspect of innate and adaptive immune responses orchestrated by a network of T cells, eosinophils, mast cells and tissue structural cells such as epithelial cells. The rapidly increasing prevalence of allergy and the epidemiologic identification of environmental risk factors for the related disease will shed light on gene-environment interactions -which would modify the output of the network - and suggest new avenues of investigation for future studies in this field.