Otitis media (OM) is the most prevalent childhood disease in developed countries. Involvement of innate immunity mediated by Toll-like receptors (TLRs) in OM has been implicated primarily in cell lines and by association studies of innate immune gene polymorphisms with OM prevalence. However, the precise role of innate immunity in OM is incompletely understood. We review recent research that ha...

Innate immunity is a primordial system that has a primary role in lung antimicrobial defenses. Recent advances in understanding the recognition systems by which cells of the innate immune system recognize and respond to microbial products have revolutionized the understanding of host defenses in the lungs and other tissues. The innate immune system includes lung leukocytes and also epithelial c...

The knowledge of how organisms fight infections has largely been built upon the ability of host innate immune molecules to recognize microbial determinants. Although of overwhelming importance, pathogen recognition is but only one of the facets of innate immunity. A primitive yet effective antimicrobial mechanism which operates by depriving microbial organisms of their nutrients has been brough...

Protein ubiquitination regulated by ubiquitin ligases plays important roles in innate immunity. However, key regulators of ubiquitination during innate response and roles of new types of ubiquitination (apart from Lys48- and Lys63-linkage) in control of innate signaling have not been clearly understood. Here we report that F-box only protein Fbxo21, a functionally unknown component of SCF (Skp1...

There are at least five families of microbe-detection receptors that function to detect and eradicate potentially infectious microorganisms that enter multicellular eukaryotes. While a multitude of proteins regulating innate immune signal transduction have already been defined, continuous genetic screening for regulators of innate immunity may not yield as significant insight into the operation...

We previously identified Tbc1d23 as a candidate novel regulator of innate immunity using comparative genomics RNA interference screens in Caenorhabditis elegans and mouse macrophages. Using Tbc1d23 knockout mice and macrophages engineered to overexpress Tbc1d23, we now show that Tbc1d23 is a general inhibitor of innate immunity signaling, strongly inhibiting multiple TLR and dectin-signaling pa...

The innate immune system existed prior to the emergence of adaptive immunity in sharks and higher vertebrates. Homologues of many mammalian innate immune-system elements such as the toll-like receptors exist in species as distant as Drosophila. Selective pressure has led to the development of highly conserved, soluble, and cell-surface receptors that recognize functionally essential molecules s...

The hepatic innate immune system consists of predominant innate immunity, which plays an important role in innate defense against infection and tumor transformation. Emerging evidence suggests that innate immunity also contributes to liver injury, repair, and fibrosis. The present review summarizes the recent findings on the role of innate immunity in liver fibrosis. In general, Kupffer cells s...

The hepatitis B virus (HBV) infects hepatocytes, which are the main cell type composing a human liver. However, the liver is enriched with immune cells, particularly innate cells (e.g., myeloid cells, natural killer and natural killer T-cells (NK/NKT), dendritic cells (DCs)), in resting condition. Hence, the study of the interaction between HBV and innate immune cells is instrumental to: (1) be...

Micronutrients such as zinc, selenium, iron, copper, beta-carotene, vitamins A, C, and E, and folic acid can influence several components of innate immunity. Select micronutrients play an important role in alteration of oxidant-mediated tissue injury, and phagocytic cells produce reactive oxidants as part of the defense against infectious agents. Thus, adequate micronutrients are required to pr...