The Langerhans cell: its origin, nature, and function

Abstract

This is the biography of a cell--a cell as elusive and as deceiving as any in medical literature. This is the biography of the Langerhans cell, literally a cell at our fingertips, yet seemingly always beyond our intellectual grasp. Here is the story of a foundling within our epidermis, yet outside our pathologist's daily view. It is the history of a cell whose stain and form belied its function. It is a biography of a cell which virtually hid from us until it came under the revealing beam of the electron microscope.