Sestito Lauren F, Thomas Susan N
Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, and Parker H. Petit Institute of Bioengineering and Bioscience, Georgia Institute of Technology, 315 Ferst Drive NW, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States.
Department of Biomedical Engineering, Emory University, 201 Dowman Drive, Atlanta, Georgia 30322, United States.
ACS Pharmacol Transl Sci. 2019 Sep 4;2(5):293-310. doi: 10.1021/acsptsci.9b00047. eCollection 2019 Oct 11.
Immunoengineering is a rapidly growing and interdisciplinary field focused on developing tools to study and understand the immune system, then employing that knowledge to modulate immune response for the treatment of disease. Because of its roles in housing a substantial fraction of the body's lymphocytes, in facilitating immune cell trafficking, and direct immune modulatory functions, among others, the lymphatic system plays multifaceted roles in immune regulation. In this review, the potential for biomaterials to be applied to regulate the lymphatic system and its functions to achieve immunomodulation and the treatment of disease are described. Three related processes-lymphangiogenesis, lymphatic vessel contraction, and lymph node remodeling-are specifically explored. The molecular regulation of each process and their roles in pathologies are briefly outlined, with putative therapeutic targets and the lymphatic remodeling that can result from disease highlighted. Applications of biomaterials that harness these pathways for the treatment of disease via immunomodulation are discussed.
免疫工程是一个快速发展的跨学科领域，专注于开发工具来研究和理解免疫系统，然后利用这些知识调节免疫反应以治疗疾病。由于淋巴系统在容纳人体大部分淋巴细胞、促进免疫细胞运输以及直接发挥免疫调节功能等方面发挥着作用，因此在免疫调节中具有多方面的作用。在这篇综述中，描述了生物材料应用于调节淋巴系统及其功能以实现免疫调节和疾病治疗的潜力。具体探讨了三个相关过程——淋巴管生成、淋巴管收缩和淋巴结重塑。简要概述了每个过程的分子调节及其在病理中的作用，强调了假定的治疗靶点以及疾病可能导致的淋巴重塑。讨论了利用这些途径通过免疫调节治疗疾病的生物材料应用。
