Fol. Biol. 2005, 51, 148-156
Toll-like Receptors. I. Structure, Function and Their Ligands
The innate immune system senses invading microorganisms by a phylogenetically conserved family of proteins PRRs of which TLRs are ones of the most important. There are at least 10 different TLRs in humans and 11 in mice. They have in the course of evolution specialized for the recognition of conserved structures among microorganisms called PAMPs. Activation of TLRs results in induction of innate immunity mechanisms as well in development of antigen-specific adaptive immune responses, thus bridging innate and adaptive immunity.
Keywords
dendritic cells, Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria, lipopolysaccharide, PAMPs, PRRs, TLRs, TH-cell polarization, viruses.
Funding
The study was supported by the Research Programs of the Ministry of Education of the Slovak Republic: VEGA 1/0543/03.
References
Copyright
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.