Rinkevich Baruch
Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research; National Institute of Oceanography; Haifa, Israel.
Chimerism. 2011 Jan;2(1):1-5. doi: 10.4161/chim.2.1.14725.
Although immunity in multicellular organisms is efficient in dealing with alien agents, it may fail for allogeneic chimerism. Natural chimerism is widely documented in nature, distributed in at least ten phyla of protists, invertebrates and plants, vertebrates and mammals, including humans; it is an important ecological/evolutionary tool manipulating metazoans' life history portraits. Instead of purging allogeneic nascent selfish cells, a 'double edged sword' chimerism emerges, displaying environmental dictated costs and benefits for the genotypes involved. Benefits include the development of synergistic complementation, the increase of genetic variability, the assurance of mate location, improved size-dependent ecological qualities (growth rates, reproduction, survivorship, competition, environmental tolerance) and more. Costs include the threat of somatic and germ cell parasitism, developmental instability, death, diseases, autoimmunity, sexual sterility and organ malformations, which develop as well in mammalian natural chimerism, including humans. Because of its importance, medical sciences should study and harness natural chimerism properties for clinical purposes.
尽管多细胞生物中的免疫在应对外来病原体时很有效，但对于同种异体嵌合体可能会失效。自然嵌合体在自然界中有广泛记载，分布于原生生物、无脊椎动物、植物、脊椎动物和哺乳动物（包括人类）的至少十个门中；它是一种操纵后生动物生命历程的重要生态/进化工具。一种“双刃剑”式的嵌合体出现了，它不是清除新生的同种异体自私细胞，而是对所涉及的基因型显示出由环境决定的成本和收益。好处包括协同互补的发展、遗传变异性的增加、配偶定位的保证、与体型相关的生态质量（生长速率、繁殖、生存、竞争、环境耐受性等）的改善等。成本包括体细胞和生殖细胞寄生的威胁、发育不稳定性、死亡、疾病、自身免疫、性不育和器官畸形，这些在包括人类在内的哺乳动物自然嵌合体中也会出现。由于其重要性，医学应该为临床目的研究和利用自然嵌合体的特性。
