The immune system doesn’t just react locally — it anticipates. Our lab investigates how conventional dendritic cells (cDCs) act as central sensors: decoding signals from the bone marrow to configure immunity across tissues.

cDCs act as immune sentinels in all mammalian tissues. They decode the physiological state of the organism and relay this information to both immune and non-immune cells to coordinate immunity and tolerance. cDCs in tissues originate from bone marrow progenitors that constantly replenish tissues.

We propose that cDCs are not solely shaped by signals in peripheral tissues, but that their progenitors in the bone marrow can sense the physiological status of the organism. This enables the immune system to pre-program cDCs centrally to meet tissue-specific demands — from viral clearance to tissue repair and cancer destruction.

By studying this “central sensing” axis, we aim to reveal how cDC diversity is generated, how division of labour amongst cDC subsets is imprinted in the bone marrow, and how this logic can be harnessed for vaccines and cancer immunotherapy.

Our work is supported by the Champalimaud Foundation, a European Research Council Starting Grant (StG 101116335), and an EHA Kick-Off Grant.

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