Extensively updated, with new contributors, brilliant new illustrations and a wealth of supporting material online, this 7th edition offers you a carefully structured approach to learning the building blocks of the immune system as well as initiation and actions of the immune response. The website which accompanies this text gives access to all the images in the book, up to 20 detailed animation sequences (which link to further supporting text, illustrations, molecular models and video clips), 8 lectures which explain how the immune system responds to different infections or to tissue grafts, and a test bank of 300 USMLE-style questions.

Table of Contents

1 Introduction to the immune system

Components of the Immune System
2 Cells, tissues and organs of the immune system
3 Antibodies
4 Complement
5 T cell receptors and MHC molecules

Modes of Immune Response
6 Mechanisms of innate immunity
7 Antigen presentation
8 The antibody response
9 Mononuclear phagocytes in immune defence
10 Cell mediated cytotoxicity
11 Regulation of the immune response
12 Immune responses in tissues

Defense Against Infectious Agents
13 Immunity to viruses
14 Immunity to bacteria and fungi
15 Immunity to protozoa and worms
16 Primary Immunodeficiency
17 AIDS and secondary immunodeficiency
18 Vaccination against infection

Immune Responses Against Tissues
19 Immunological tolerance
20 Autoimmune disease
21 Transplantation and rejection
22 Tumour immunotherapy

Hypersensitivity
23 Type I hypersensitivity
24 Type II and III hypersensitivity - basic science
25 Type II and III hypersensitivity - clinical
26 Type IV hypersensitivity