From the article: This overturns the traditional thinking that regulatory T cells exist as multiple specialist populations that are restricted to specific parts of the body. The finding has implications for the treatment of many different diseases – because almost all diseases and injuries trigger the body’s immune system.

Current anti-inflammatory drugs treat the whole body, rather than just the part needing treatment. The researchers say their findings mean it could be possible to shut down the body’s immune response and repair damage in any specific part of the body, without affecting the rest of it. This means that higher, more targeted doses of drugs could be used to treat disease – potentially with rapid results.

“We’ve uncovered new rules of the immune system. This ‘unified healer army’ can do everything - repair injured muscle, make your fat cells respond better to insulin, regrow hair follicles. To think that we could use it in such an enormous range of diseases is fantastic: it’s got the potential to be used for almost everything,” said Professor Adrian Liston in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Pathology, senior author of the paper.

To reach this discovery, the researchers analysed the regulatory T cells present in 48 different tissues in the bodies of mice. This revealed that the cells are not specialised or static, but move through the body to where they’re needed. The results are published today in the journal Immunity: doi.org/10.1016/j.immuni.2024.05.023