Immunology has contributed to biomedical education in many important ways since the creation of scientific medicine in the last quarter of the 19th century. Today, immunology is a major area of biomedical research. Nevertheless, there are many basic problems unresolved in immunological activities and phenomena. Solving these problems is probably necessary to devise predictable and safe ways to produce new vaccines, treat allergy and autoimmune diseases and perform safe transplants. This challenge involves not only technical developments but also changes in attitude, of which the most fundamental is to abandon the traditional stimulus-response perspective in favor of more "systemic" views. Describing immunological activities as the operation of a complex multiconnected network, raises biological and epistemological issues not usually dealt with in biomedical education. Here we point to one example of systemic approaches. A new form of immunoblot (Panama blot), by which the reaction of natural immunoglobulins with complex protein mixtures may be analyzed by a special software and multivariate statistics, has been recently used to characterize human autoimmune diseases. Our preliminary data show that Panama blots can also be used to characterize global (systemic) immunogical changes in chronic human parasitic diseases, such as malaria and schistosomiasis mansoni, that correlate with the clinical status.

Há relações lineares entre a dose de Al (OH)3 usado como adjuvante imunológico e o título de anticorpos anti-ovoalbumina (anti-OVA) formado por camundongos BDFI. Camundongos que receberam OVA, depois uma imunização acessoria com dinitrofenil-hemocianina (DNP-KLH) e então uma imunização secundária com DNP-OVA, só formaram anticorpos anti-DNP quando havia Al (OH)3 incluído na injeção de DNP-KLH; a inclusão de Al (OH)3 na injeção primária de OVA baixou em vez de elevar o título de anticorpos anti-DNP. E sugerido que a ação adjuvante do Al(OH)3 se deva a ações sobre linfócitos B.

Linear relationships were found between the dose of A1(OH)3 adjuvant and the titer of anti-OVA antibodies formed by BDF1 mice. Mice immunized with OVA, DNP-KLH and then boosted with DNP-OVA formed anti-DNP antibodies only when A1(OH)3 was added to the injection of DNP-KLH; addition of A1(OH)3 to the priming injection of OVA decreased, rather than increased antibody formation.

Camundongos adultos normais tornados imunologicamente tolerantes a ovoalbumina (OVA) por exposição oral não formam anticorpos antidinitrofenil (anti-DNP) quando imunizados com DNP-OVA, mas respondem normalmente à DNP-hemocianina (DNO-KLH). Entretanto, a adição de DNP-OVA à injeção de DNP-KLH reduz a formação de anticorpos anti-DNP em animais tolerantes a OVA, mas não em animais normais. Similarmente animais tolerantes à OVA formam menos anticorpos antiglobulina humana (HGG) quando imunizados com agregados (por glutaraldeído) de OVA e HGG. A tolerância oral e, portanto, capaz de inibir a indução de respostas imunes por um esquema de supressão-cruzada. Esse esquema, no entanto, não foi capaz de inibir respostas imunes já iniciadas.

Adult normal inbred mice rendered tolerant to OVA by previous oral exposure do not respond to intraperitonela immunization with DNP-OVA in adjuvant. These tolerant mice also form less DNP-specific antibodies to DNP-KLH when immunized with mixtures of DNP-KLH and DNP-OVA, or less HGG-specific antibodies when immunized with cross-linked conjugates of OVA and HGG. These same procedures increased DNP-specific or HGG-specific responses in non-tolerant control mice. The cross-supperssion was ineffective, however, to inhibit already ongoing antibody responses.