Research

Neuroimmunological aspects of health and disease

The central nervous system (CNS) is isolated from the circulation, and protected behind barriers [the blood-brain barrier (BBB) and blood-cerebrospinal fluid barrier (BCSFB)]. As such, it has long been regarded as an immune privileged organ, and circulating leukocytes ...

Immune cell involvement in healthy brain function

Brain tissue maintenance, adult neurogenesis, learning and memory

Beyond repair, our group was the first to propose found that the immune system supports healthy brain plasticity, with positive effects on adult neurogenesis, and spatial learning and memory [1, 2]. Moreover circulating immune cells ...

Alzheimer’s disease immunotherapy

A novel use of immune checkpoint blockade approach

The importance of the choroid plexus (CP) in the crosstalk between the CNS and the immune system, has suggested that the way this interface is functioning might be critical to the ability of the CNS to cope with neurodegenerative conditions

Immune cells involvement in CNS repair

Experimental models of acute CNS injuries

More than a decade ago, the group started to investigate experimental paradigms addressing a basic question in neuroscience: why have the brain and spinal cord, crucial organs of the body, lost their capacity for spontaneous repair following injury? We discovered, ...

Communication between the brain and the circulation

The brain’s choroid plexus: a unique neuro-immunological interface

In an attempt to understand how T cells can support the brain even though they are excluded from direct interaction with the brain parenchyma, we found that effector and regulatory CD4 T cells with specificity to CNS-antigens reside in the stroma of the brain’s ...