Immunology Seminar, Susanna Fagerholm
2025-10-07 14:00 - 15:00 (Europe/Helsinki)
October 7th at 14-15 (Finland time)

Virtual event

Flyer

Susanna Fagerholm, University of Helsinki: Dendritic cell mechanical immune memory

Register for the Immunology Seminar Series email list to get calendar invitation to the online seminar: https://link.webropolsurveys.com/S/D29C32AA6E8A2F7A

Host: Professor Riitta Lahesmaa ( rilahes@utu.fi )

Immunology seminar series is jointly organised by the Finnish Society for Immunology, InFLAMES Flagship and Turku Bioscience. For further information contact Anne Lahdenperä ( ankahy@utu.fi ) or Riitta Lahesmaa ( rilahes@utu.fi ), University of Turku.

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Susanna Fagerholm is Professor of Cell and Molecular Biology at Faculty of Bio- and Environmental Sciences, University of Helsinki. She heads the Integrins in immunity research group. The group’s current main research interest lays in investigating how mechanical interactions of myeloid immune cells with their tissue microenvironment regulates their function. We focus mainly on dendritic cells, the main antigen presenting cells of the immune system. We propose that cellular interactions with the microenvironment play more important roles in regulating immune cell programming than previously thought, through so called “mechanical immune memory”. The immune cell “remembers” its mechanical interactions with the environment through epigenetic and metabolic effects, which impacts on immune cell gene expression, programming and cell function. Loss of cell adhesion to the microenvironment may constitute a new “danger signal” that induces myeloid cell reprogramming and increased immune responses in vivo.

References
1. Harjunpää H, Somermäki R, Saldo Rubio G, Fusciello M, Feola S, Faisal I, Nieminen AI, Wang L, Llort Asens M, Zhao H, Eriksson O, Cerullo V, & Fagerholm SC. 2024. Loss of β2-integrin function results in metabolic reprogramming of dendritic cells, leading to increased dendritic cell functionality and anti-tumor responses. OncoImmunology, 13(1):2369373
2. Harjunpää H, Tallberg R, Cui Y, Guenther C, Liew HK, Seelbach A, Saldo Rubio G, Airavaara M, Fagerholm SC. 2024. β2-Integrins Regulate Microglial Responses and the Functional Outcome of Hemorrhagic Stroke In Vivo. J Immunol. 213(4):519-525.
3. Fagerholm SC. 2022. Integrins in health and diseases. New Engl J Med. 387:1519-1521.
4. Guenther C, Faisal I, Fusciello M, Sokolova M, Ilander M, Harjunpää H, Tallberg R, Vartiainen M, Gonzalez-Granado J-M, Alon R, Cerullo V, Fagerholm SC. 2021. β2-integrin adhesion regulate dendritic cell epigenetic and transcriptional landscapes to restrict dendritic cell maturation and tumour rejection. Cancer Immunol Res. 9:1354–69
5. Savinko T, Guenther C, Uotila L, Llort Asens M, Yao S, Tojkander S, Fagerholm SC. 2018. Filamin A is required for optimal T cell integrin-mediated force transmission, flow adhesion and T cell trafficking. J Immunol. 200(9):3109-3116.
6. Morrison VL, James MJ, Grzes K, Cook P, Glass DG, Lek HS, Gawden-Bone C, Watts C, Millington OR, MacDonald AS, Fagerholm SC. 2014. Loss of beta2-integrin-mediated cytoskeletal linkage reprograms dendritic cells to a mature migratory phenotype. Nat Commun. 5: 5359.
