Immune
Episodes
Immune Booster 28: Immunometabolism, Inflammation, and Building Biotechs with Luke O'Neill
05 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Luke O'Neill recounts his role in discovering key components of the TLR signaling pathway, explains how pursuing unexpected research questions keeps h...
Immune Booster 27: Interferons, JAKs, and STATs with George Stark
28 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
George Stark from the Cleveland Clinic reflects on his early training in biochemistry and how several sabbatical leaves sparked pivotal changes in his...
Immune 103: Cytokines 101
21 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The Immune team talks all about cytokines, from what they are to immunotherapies against them to treat diseases. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Cindy Le...
Immune Booster 26: Immune defense against parasitic worms with Irah King
07 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Irah King from McGill University talks about his passion to understand how our immune system detects and responds to helminthic worm infections, how t...
Immune102: Living longer without B cells
31 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The Immune team discusses a paper describing the negative effects of old B cells on T cells and longevity and a snippet on an interesting vaccine app...
Immune Booster 25: Out of the anti-vax woods with Ellen Woods
17 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A former anti-vax mom talks about going down the rabbit hole, her mindset shift, the importance of doctors who are willing to talk with patients about...
Immune Booster 24: Tolerating pregnancy with Gabrielle Rizzuto
03 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Gabrielle Rizzuto from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center discusses her work on the curious immunology of pregnancy and how a woman tolerates a ge...
Immune 101: Ink and immunity
24 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses how tattoo ink accumulates in lymph nodes, promotes inflammation and influences response to two different vaccines. Hosts: Vincent R...
Immune Booster 23: Critical windows during immune system development with Anna Beaudin
17 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Anna Beaudin from University of Utah talks about the key thread of her career, development, and how that influences her research on the events happeni...
Immune Booster #22 T cell signaling and selection with Leslie Berg
10 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Leslie Berg talks about her career studying T cell receptor signaling, T cell development, and the importance of mentors in her career. ...
Immune 100: Immune turns 100!
27 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The whole Immune gang gathers with special guests Gretchen Diehl and Shruti Naik at The Incubator with an audience to celebrate the 100th episode. Ho...
Immune Booster 21: Origins of antigen receptors with David Schatz
13 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
David Schatz talks about his discovery of Rag genes that are critical for antigen receptor development and how that discovery depended on taking high...
Immune 99: A Nobel for immune tolerance
30 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Immune team discusses the groundbreaking discoveries of regulatory T cells, which was the topic of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine....
Immune Booster 20: Lipid GPS for T cells with Susan Schwab
16 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Susan Schwab talks about how she got the research bug, bugs she ate, and her research on how the lipid S1P helps T cells decide- should I stay or sho...
Immune 98: T cells on the brain
25 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses cross-reactive antibodies to avian influenza neuraminidases and a role for gut-derived T cells in the brain to regulate eating behavi...
Immune Booster 19: Virus-immune Tug-of-war with Kristian Andersen
11 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Kristian Andersen from Scripps Research Institute joins Cindy to talk about how he got interested in virus evolution, how the immune system drives vir...
Immune 97: Bystander B cells go bananas
28 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Cindy and Steph discuss a paper that challenges the textbook dogma that B cells must first bind to an antigen for antibody affinity maturation to occu...
Immune Booster 18: From Stars to cells with Bali Pulendran
14 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Cindy sits down with Bali Pulendran at the AAI 2025 meeting where he told the story of how a childhood fascination with the cosmos grew into a career ...
Immune Booster #17: From unvaccinated to vaccine advocacy with Liz Marnik
07 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Elizabeth Marnik, also known as Science Whiz Liz, grew up unvaccinated, yet she is now an immunologist, science communicator, and advocate for vaccine...
Immune 96: How to floss a mouse
30 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses the potential future of delivering vaccines by flossing your teeth and how antibodies in human milk shape the normal immune responses...
Immune Booster #16: Teaching and communicating immunology with Aimee Pugh Bernard
16 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Cindy speaks with Aimee Pugh Bernard from University of Colorado about her career and her passion for teaching and communicating immunology to the pu...
Immune 95: Mitochondria for everyone
26 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses how cancer cells swap mitochondria with T cells and then digs in for a discussion of an unusual checkpoint blockade that failed for...
Immune Booster #15 Vaccine ground rules with Shane Crotty
12 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Cindy talks with Shane Crotty about his teenage days driving 3 ½ hours every weekend to have his first research experience in marine biology, how tha...
Immune 94: The nose knows
29 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Immune team goes up the nose to discuss cytotoxic T cells activating complement through secretion of granzyme K to drive inflammatory nasal polyp...
Immune Booster #14: In the eye of immune responses with Darren Lee
08 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
From the 2024 Society for Leukocyte Biology meeting, Cindy and Brianne talk with Darren Lee to discuss his career, how he got interested in immunology...
Immune 93: Macrophages managing memory B cells
24 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Vincent and Cindy discuss differences between MPox-specific T cell responses following infection and vaccination, and lymph node macrophage control o...
Immune Booster #13 Microbiome and regulation of gut inflammation with Justin Wilson
10 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
From the 2024 Society for Leukocyte Biology meeting, Cindy and Brianne sit down with Justin Wilson to talk about how he got into research and his more...
Immune 92: Gut symbiont breaks antibody
27 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Steph talks about identification of gut bacteria that can digest protective mucosal antibodies and Vincent covers a new paper on Zika virus that impl...
Immune Booster #12: Innate immunity to Archaea with Holger Heine
13 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
From the 2024 Society for Leukocyte Biology meeting, Immune talks with Holger Heine about the discovery of immune recognition of bacterial lipopolysac...
Immune 91: People, parasites, plagues, and podcasts
29 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune talks with David Peterson and Kim Klonowski from the University of Georgia about their careers, their People, parasites, and plagues podcast, p...
Immune Booster #11 Immunity to Fungi with Amy Hise
09 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
From the 2024 Society for Leukocyte Biology meeting, Immune talks with Amy Hise about her career in science, her current research using mouse models f...
Immune 90: Immunology of Injury
25 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune 90: Immunology of Injury March 25, 2025 From the 2024 Society for Leukocyte Biology meeting at Michigan State University, home of the Spartan...
Immune Booster #10 HIV in the brain with Amanda Brown
17 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune Booster #10 HIV in the brain with Amanda Brown March 18, 2025 From the The Society for Leukocyte Biology 2024 conference at Michigan State Un...
Immune 89: Misplaced antibodies and foreign food foes
26 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses how non-neutralizing antibodies can still be protective…intracellularly, and a technically innovative paper that uses Lipstic to la...
Immune 88: Bespoke antibodies and stinging erythropoiesis
29 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune describes the use of bespoke antibodies to characterize immune cell populations in cave nectar bats, and co-option of retrotransposons to activ...
Immune 87: When the immune system misbehaves
14 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses basophils as regulators of of lung inflammation over space and time, and neoself-antigens as the primary target for autoreactive T ce...
Immune 86: Where did the SARS-CoV-2 antibodies go?
26 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains how distinct olfactory mucosal macrophage populations mediate neuronal maintenance and pathogen defense, and failure to establish dura...
Immune 85: Immune trade-offs
29 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explores the immunological diversity in the upper airway, including memory B and T cells and germinal center B cells, and how chronic infection...
Immune 84: Gender-affirming therapy and immune responses with Petter Brodin
24 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Petter Brodin joins Immune to discuss immune system adaptation in individuals assigned female sex at birth and undergoing gender affirming testosteron...
Immune Booster #9: Autoimmune diseases with Mark Shlomchik
10 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Steph meet up with Mark Shlomchik to talk about his career and th...
Immune Booster #8: Immunology, metabolism, and exercise physiology with Heather Caslin
03 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Brianne meet up with Heather Caslin to talk about her training an...
Immune 83: Immune cells eating other cells
27 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses two stories of immune cells eating other cells: microglia engulfing brain neurons to shape cortical development and behavior, and mas...
Immune Booster #7: Emerging viruses with David Martinez
20 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Steph meet up with David Martinez to talk about his career, the r...
Immune Booster #6: From Ghana to heat shock with Robert Binder
13 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Brianne meet up with Robert Binder to talk about his career, the ...
Immune Booster #5: Infections and the gut microbiome with Rafael Polidoro
06 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Steph meet up with Rafael Polidoro to talk about his career, the ...
Immune 82: Bat antibodies are hot
30 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reviews the local and systemic responses after human SARS-CoV-2 challenge infection, and how bat antibodies display elevated antigen binding st...
Immune Booster #4: Human autoimmunity with Jane Buckner
23 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Steph meet up with Jane Buckner to talk about her career, and the...
Immune Booster #3: NKT cells and cancer, and DEI in research with Tonya Webb
16 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Brianne meet up with Tonya Webb to talk about her career, the rol...
Immune Booster #2: Sex differences in immune responses with Michal Tal
09 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Brianne meet up with Michal Tal to talk about her career, sex dif...
Immune Booster #1: From bench to bedside to beat HIV with Luis Montaner
02 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From the American Association of Immunologists 2024 conference in Chicago, Cindy and Brianne where meet up with Luis Montaner to talk about his career...
Immune 81: T cells and tolerance with Joseph Larkin III
25 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune travels to Chicago for the American Association of Immunologists conference where they meet up with Joseph Larkin III to talk about his career ...
Immune 80: Intranasal neomycin; sex hormones and skin immunity; and maternal diet and infant microbiomes
28 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune presents three stories: intranasal neomycin and antiviral immunity, sexual dimorphism in skin immunity, and maternal diet changes infant microb...
Immune 79: Spa therapy for the immune system
26 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains how antibody-mediated depletion of myeloid-hematopoietic stem cells in aged mice restores characteristic features of a more youthful i...
Immune 78: Tolerance and tolerating many vaccines
26 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses responses in a COVID hypervaccinated individual, synthetically glycosylated antigens for the antigen-specific suppression of establis...
Immune 77: Squeezing the most killing out of neutrophils
27 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reviews research showing that the migration of neutrophils between endothelial cells activates bactericidal function via mechanosensing. Hosts:...
Immune 76: Macrophages to the rescue with Juliet Morrison
30 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Juliet Morrison joins Immune to discuss her career and the research of her laboratory showing that pleural macrophages translocate to the lung during ...
Immune 75: Ang Cui unveils the cytokine symphony
28 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Ang Cui joins Immune to discuss her career and her work on establishing the Immune Dictionary, a compendium of single-cell transcriptomic profiles of ...
Immune 74: Germinal center dynamics with Carla Nowosad
11 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Carla Nowosad joins Immune to discuss her career and her work on germinal centers, the structure in secondary lymphoid tissues where B cells prolifera...
Immune 73: Big macs
08 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reveals the total mass (1.2kg), number (1.8 trillion), and distribution of immune cells in the human body, with macrophages contributing nearly...
Immune 72: After dark in the library with Ellen Rothenberg
23 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
From Cornell University in Ithaca New York, Vincent and Cindy meet with Ellen Rothenberg to review her career in science, starting with work on retrov...
Immune 71: Can parasitic worms prevent pandemics?
08 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains how, in a mouse model of roundworm infection with Nippostrongylus brasiliensis, exposure to lung-migrating helminths protects mice aga...
Immune 70: Immunology of picky eating
26 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains how mast cells, IgE antibody, and the brain collaborate to promote avoidance of certain foods to evade allergic responses. Hosts: Vin...
Immune 69: Lung cancer and retroviruses
15 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Kevin joins Immune to discuss his work showing that antibodies against endogenous retroviruses promote immunotherapy of lung cancer. Hosts: Vincent R...
Immune 68: Sins and blessings of immunity
18 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses immunological imprinting, also called original antigenic sin, in the context of infection with SARS-CoV-2 and influenza virus. Hosts:...
Immune 67: Can T cells live forever?
03 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains the results of a study which show that in mice, functional T cells respond to vaccination for over 10 years and 51 successive immuniza...
Immune 66: COVID-19 immune memory - what you need to know
04 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Immune discusses the current understanding of immune memory to SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 vaccines, which supersedes that of any other acute in...
Immune 65: Infection infidelities with Jonathan Kagan
20 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Jon joins Immune to discuss the research of his laboratory on understanding how the innate immune system recognizes and responds to pathogens, and his...
Immune 64: A tangled web of wires
24 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Cindy, Steph, Brianne, and Vincent do a rapid review 11 immunology papers, including a wiring diagram for the immune system, group A streptococcus vac...
Immune 63: Immune, promptly
20 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Cindy, Steph, Brianne, and Vincent review some of their favorite immunology papers of 2022. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Cynthia Leifer, Steph Langel, ...
Immune 62: Every cell is an immune cell with De'Broski Herbert
02 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
De'Broski joins immune to reveal his remarkable career path and the research of his laboratory on neuroimmunology and the immune response to parasite ...
Immune 61: Training immune cells with Julia Bohannon and Musa Mhlanga
08 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From SLB22 on the Island of Hawai'i, Julia and Musa join Immune to reveal their remarkable career paths, and their research on understanding trained i...
Immune 60: Immunoeducation with Sumali Pandey and Phil Mixter
22 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Somali and Phil join Immune to discuss their approaches to immunology education. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Cynthia Leifer, Steph Langel, and Brianne...
Immune 59: Forks in the road: Th17 cells with Mandy McGeachy
19 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
At Cornell University in Ithaca, NY, Mandy joins Immune to discuss her career and her research on understanding how Th17 cells develop and are influen...
Immune 58: Gut B cells awry in ulcerative colitis
03 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains a study of three cohorts of patients with ulcerative colitis which finds major perturbations within the mucosal B cell compartment, hi...
Immune 57: Bacteria, the new cure for wounds?
30 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reviews data showing that in mice, skin bacteria activate keratinocytes to stimulate hair follicle regeneration and wound healing. Hosts: Vinc...
Immune 56: Flip flops on the thymic beach with Al Singer
01 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Al Singer joins immune to discuss mice that have their T cell immune system reversed, revealing the molecular basis for T cell lineage fate determinat...
Immune 55: Cells that suck at their job
03 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reveals a CD8+ regulatory subset of T cell subset that suppress pathogenic T cells and are active in autoimmune diseases and infectious disease...
Immune 54: Asthma and aging
06 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains how aging influences chronic outcomes of respiratory viral infection through regulation of the alveolar macrophage compartment and typ...
Immune 53: Dendritic cell robbers
21 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reveals that marginal zone B cells steal complexes of MHC and complement C3 from dendritic cells for antigen presentation to T cells. Hosts: V...
Immune 52: B cell boot camp with Gabriel Victora
29 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Gabriel Victora joins Immune to review how high affinity antibodies are produced in the germinal centers of secondary lymphoid tissues. Hosts: Vincen...
Immune 51: Teenage NINJA mice with Nikhil Joshi
22 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Nikhil Joshi joins Immune to discuss the creation of NINJA mice that synthesize neoantigens to enable the study of endogenous antigen-specific naïve ...
Immune 50: Red blood cells are immune sentinels
11 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reviews evidence that toll-like receptor 9 on the surface of red blood cells binds DNA, leading to uptake by macrophages and innate immune acti...
Immune 49: I fell in love with worms with Keke Fairfax
13 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Keke Fairfax joins Immune to discuss the work from her laboratory on understanding how maternal schistosomiasis impairs IL-4 production and B cell exp...
Immune 48: Environmental enteric dysfunction with Timothy Hand
13 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Tim Hand joins Immune to discuss the work from his laboratory showing that environmental enteric dysfunction, a disease caused by chronic malnutrition...
Immune 47: Trapping viruses in NETs
23 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The immune professors discuss neutrophil extracellular traps, and how IgA-virus immune complexes potentiate this process through Fc receptors on neutr...
Immune 46: Bats don't STING like a bee
27 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explore the observation that bat cells display dampened STING-dependent interferon activation, suggesting why bats might have a unique capacity...
Immune 45: Immune messages
16 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
On this episode of Immune, we answer listener questions about CAR-Macs, complement and COVID-19, sleep and the immune system, caving and the immune sy...
Immune 44: Got IgA on the brain
17 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
On this episode of Immune, IgA-producing plasma cells mobilized from the gut play an unexpected role in suppressing neuroinflammation. Hosts: Vincent...
Immune 43: CAR-NK and CAR-MAC, thinking outside the CAR-T cell box
24 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
On this episode of Immune, Cindy provides an update on CAR-T cell therapy of cancers and introduces two new approaches that utilize NK cells and macr...
Immune 42: Evolution of SARS-CoV-2 antibody immunity with Christian Gaebler
13 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Christian joins Immune to discuss the humoral memory response in a cohort of 87 individuals 1.3 and 6.2 months after infection with SARS-CoV-2. Hosts:...
Immune 41: Zebrafish immunology with Madina Wane
25 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Madina joins Immune to explain how the immune system of zebrafish gills compares to its functional counterpart in mammals, the lungs, and to discuss a...
Immune 40: COVID-19 nuances
30 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune reminisces about a year in COVID-19 immunology, Steph's receiving the Pfizer vaccine, and answers to listener questions about a challenge study...
Immune 39: A Tonka Truck full of salt
01 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune catches up on COVID listener email, including discussions about long-term COVID, cross-reactive memory to SARS-CoV-2, common mucosal surfaces,...
Immune 38: COVID-19 and kids with Sallie Permar
28 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Sallie joins Immune to discuss her career, emphasizing the importance of a good mentor and the ability to pivot, and her research, which has focused o...
Immune 37: Black in Immuno
16 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Alexis, Joel, Elaine, Justine, and Evonne join Immune to discuss their careers, their research, and a platform created by a collective of Black immuno...
Immune 36: Aberrant immunity in COVID-19
21 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune describes the striking loss of germinal centers in lymph nodes and spleen in patients with severe COVID-19, providing an explanation for short...
Immune 35: SARS-CoV-2 antibodies
23 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune examines antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, including the relationship between severe COVID-19 and anti-spike antibodies, kinetics of production, and co...
Immune 34: Coronavirus cross-reacting T cells
25 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains a study demonstrating T cells that react with SARS-CoV-2 epitopes in individuals who have never been infected with the virus, implying...
Immune 33: COVID-19 immunotypes
28 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune explains a study of 125 COVID-19 patients by deep immune profiling, which revealed three immunotypes associated with poor clinical prognosis or...
Immune 32: Immunology of COVID-19, part four
05 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Immune continues a discussion of the immune response to infection with SARS-CoV-2, including inflammatory responses and disease, antibody and T-cell r...