FAST BREAKING PAPERS - 2008

Why do you think your paper is highly cited?

It's a review of a very important aspect of innate immunity—how Toll-like receptor signal.

Does it describe a new discovery, methodology, or synthesis of knowledge?

It's a synthesis of knowledge—probably the biggest one in terms of content published in 2007.

Would you summarize the significance of your paper in layman's terms?

It describes how a very important family of proteins called the Toll-like receptors work. TLRs are key initiators of the immune response to infectious agents. They are expressed on white blood cells, and when they encounter a microbe, they sense it and then activate the white blood cell to trigger an immune response. The review describes this triggering process, giving an account of so-called adapter proteins that mediate the signal inside the cell.

There is strong interest in TLRs because they are essential for the immune response, but also become dysregulated in inflammatory and immune diseases.

How did you become involved in this research?

I'd always had a strong interest in signalling in the immune system.

Where do you see your research leading in the future?

I see it leading to further work on the molecular and cellular biology of innate immunity.

Professor Luke O'Neill
Head, School of Biochemistry and Immunology
Trinity College Dublin
Ireland

Related: View New Hot Paper comments from Luke O'Neill, November 2002.

Keywords: Luke A. J. O'Neill, tir-domain-containing adaptors, toll-like receptor signalling, proteins, immune response, infectious agents, white blood cells, white blood cell, microbe, adapter proteins, tlrs, dysregulated, inflammatory, immune diseases, immune system, molecular biology, cellular biology, innate immunity, Immunology.