Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2009 Feb;87(2):113-9, discussion 120-1.
doi: 10.1038/icb.2008.96. Epub 2008 Dec 2.

On the opposing views of the self-nonself discrimination by the immune system

Affiliations

On the opposing views of the self-nonself discrimination by the immune system

Melvin Cohn. Immunol Cell Biol. 2009 Feb.

Abstract

Today's generally accepted view of the self-nonself discrimination was voiced by Miller(1) in 2004 in a thought-provoking essay. In spite of its popularity, this position has its limitations, which are analyzed here with a view toward establishing an interactive discussion that hopefully will culminate in agreed upon decisive experiments. The inadequacies of Miller's view of the self-nonself discrimination and their resolution under the associative recognition of antigen model are analyzed.

PubMed Disclaimer

Comment in

References

    1. Miller J. Self–nonself discrimination by T lymphocytes. CR Biologies. 2004;327:399–408. - PubMed
    1. Miller JFAP, Basten A. Mechanism of tolerance to self. Curr Opin Immunol. 1996;8:815–821. - PubMed
    1. Cohn M. The self–nonself discrimination: reconstructing a cabbage from sauerkraut. Res Immunol. 1992;143:323–334. - PubMed
    1. Cohn M. A biological context for the self–nonself discrimination and the regulation of effector class by the immune system. Immunol Res. 2005;31:133–150. - PubMed
    1. Cohn M. The common sense of the self–nonself discrimination. Springer Semin Immunopathol. 2005;27:3–17. - PubMed

Publication types