About this Research Topic
Our current thoughts led to focus this theme of research/ or topic because anaphylaxis has been usually studied and understood only from an immunological view, but the main lethal effects of anaphylaxis are mediated through the vasculature and other diverse organ systems. The clinical features related to anaphylaxis are well described and classified and most cellular and molecular research is focused on the immunological processes that represent the early stages of the reaction. Overall, these events are triggered mostly as hypersensitivity reactions mediated by FcεR1-bound IgE antibodies in response to allergen and result in activation of mast cells (MCs) and basophils. These immune cells are considered the effectors and amplifying the allergic reaction and its activation induces the release of mediators. Mice deficient for either MCs or IgE still develop anaphylaxis indicating that alternative pathways (to date mainly IgG) would exist. Moreover, identification of other different cell types participating in anaphylaxis (neutrophils, macrophages...) provide reasons encouraging enough to speculate about if only the known effector cells are the meaningful contributors to the human anaphylactic episodes. In anaphylaxis, there is a close interaction between immune, neural and vascular cells thus research in this area needs to shift from a purely immunological view of effectors cells (mainly mast cells), towards investigations based in "anaphylactic microenvironments" which allows to study different type of cells maintaining specific communications. The research of interests in this topic includes widely the study of molecular and cellular mechanisms in anaphylaxis observed not only from the allergic compartment if not also from other perspectives. Immunological mechanisms do not fully explain the versatility of events happening in allergic and anaphylactic reactions and recent strategies addressed to obtain a better understanding of anaphylaxis must be contemplated. A mayor effort in basic research about molecular mechanisms in anaphylaxis could offer a great relevance in the knowledge about allergic inflammatory diseases and anaphylaxis.
Keywords: anaphylaxis, allergy, vascular system, mediators, anaphylactic microenvironments, signaling
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