Submitted by Livia Harriman on Tue, 04/10/2022 - 10:22
A new review published in Nature by Professor Ashley Moffett and Norman Shreeve focuses on the local interactions that occur early in pregnancy between placental trophoblast cells and maternal uterine immune cells.
The cells which are crucial for healthy pregnancy are the subject of many questions and the role of the maternal immune system in reproductive success in humans remains controversial.
This review focuses on the events that occur in the maternal decidua during the first few weeks of human pregnancy, because this is the site at which maternal leukocytes initially interact with and can recognize fetal trophoblast cells, potentially involving allorecognition by both T cells and natural killer (NK) cells.
NK cells are the dominant leukocyte population in first-trimester decidua, and genetic studies point to a role of allorecognition by uterine NK cells in establishing a boundary between the mother and the fetus. By contrast, definitive evidence that allorecognition by decidual T cells occurs during the first trimester is lacking.
Thus, this review thakes the view that during the crucial period when the placenta is established, damaging T cell-mediated adaptive immune responses towards placental trophoblast are minimized, whereas NK cell allorecognition contributes to successful implantation and healthy pregnancy.
Read Ashley's review Local immune recognition of trophoblast in early human pregnancy: controversies and questions in Nature Reviews Immunology here: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41577-022-00777-2
Professor Ashley Moffett
Ashley's research group are investigating how the maternal immune system regulates placentation in humans.
They view the fetal allograft as one of cooperation between mother and fetus. They are focused on how the dominant population of uterine leukocytes, Natural Killer (NK) cells, that have receptors for HLA class I ligands on fetal trophoblast cells, regulate trophoblast function.
They work in close collaboration with Dr Francesco Colucci in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.
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