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Science 11 June 1999:
Vol. 284. no. 5421, pp. 1835 - 1837
DOI: 10.1126/science.284.5421.1835
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Reports

The Nature of the Principal Type 1 Interferon-Producing Cells in Human Blood

Frederick P. Siegal, 1* Norimitsu Kadowaki, 2 Michael Shodell, 3 Patricia A. Fitzgerald-Bocarsly, 4 Kokila Shah, 1 Stephen Ho, 2 Svetlana Antonenko, 2 Yong-Jun Liu 2*

Interferons (IFNs) are the most important cytokines in antiviral immune responses. "Natural IFN-producing cells" (IPCs) in human blood express CD4 and major histocompatibility complex class II proteins, but have not been isolated and further characterized because of their rarity, rapid apoptosis, and lack of lineage markers. Purified IPCs are here shown to be the CD4+CD11c- type 2 dendritic cell precursors (pDC2s), which produce 200 to 1000 times more IFN than other blood cells after microbial challenge. pDC2s are thus an effector cell type of the immune system, critical for antiviral and antitumor immune responses.

1 Saint Vincents Hospital and Medical Center, New York, NY 10011, and Long Island Jewish Medical Center-Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New Hyde Park, NY 11040, USA.
2 DNAX Research Institute, Palo Alto, CA 94304, USA.
3 The CW Post Campus of Long Island University, Brookville, NY 11548, USA.
4 University of Medicine and Dentistry, New Jersey Medical School, Newark, NJ 07103, USA.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed.

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)