There is mounting evidence that APC and T cell recruitment to peripheral tissues, including the cornea, is highly regulated and depends on recruitment signals that are either tissue-specific or inflammation-induced, or both. Neither the molecular nature of these recruitment signals nor the repertoire of traffic molecules that enable APC and T cells to detect and respond to such recruitment signals are well understood. The current proposal is a step toward understanding the tissue, cellular and molecular factors involved in the recruitment, turnover, egress and function of corneal APCs, as well as mechanisms involved in the recruitment of T cells to the cornea that could potentially lead to corneal graft rejection. We propose a more systematic in vivo approach by studying the migratory properties of APCs in the steady state, inflammation, and after corneal transplantation. Identification of the critical pathway(s) of APC and effector T cell migration to the cornea could lead to novel highly specific immunomodulatory strategies for immunotherapy, through modulation of APC and T cell migration and function. The students would be involved in translational science, image acquisition and analysis, immunohistochemistry and confocal microscopy.

To study the immunobiology and trafficking mechanisms of corneal antigen presenting cells in inflammatory corneal diseases