Our immune system can be compared to a double-edged sword. On one hand, it protects us from the onslaught of causative agent microbes, prevents excessive cell reproduction and blocks the reproduction of diseased cells. On the other, it can attack the system's own material to create autoimmune processes, while over-activity may lead to allergic reactions. A healthy immune system is capable of differentiating between its own and foreign bodies and attacking the latter, but harmful reactions can be caused by the derailment of the immune system. All these processes develop as a result of multi-layered collaboration between cell types (including phagocytes, mastocytes and lymphocytes) and various soluble molecules (such as antibodiesa and cytokines).
A genetika, immunológia és az informatika összefogása nagy népbetegségek elleni küzdelemben |
ENG |
The collaboration of genetics, immunology and information technology in the fight against the common illnesses |
HUN |
Medical immunology and genomics – hand in hand with the new possibilities offered by information technology – may help in the early recognition and cure of asthma, tumours and excessive weight gain. We introduce actual examples of the treatment of these conditions from the complex approach taken by immune genomics. The genomic systems approach to immunology today is unimaginable without high-level bioinformatics, which also heralds the dawn of an entirely new era in the prevention of immune diseases.
Értjük-e a gének nyelvét? - Bioinformatika és rendszerbiológia |
ENG |
Do we understand the language of genes? Bioinformatics and systems biology |
HUN |
The world that surrounds and shapes us – our molecules, cells and circle of friends – may be understood as a network of systems embedded within each other. We may be familiar with some of the sub-systems, but we often cannot calculate their complex and unexpected interactions. And so, even though we have the use of a vast variety of informatics tools, understanding the information content of the inherited information, the genome, is a difficult exercise. This lecture invites the audience on a journey into the world of bioinformatics, where human thought and computers together attempt to understand the language of molecules.