In its attempt to fight a serious bacterial infection, caused by listeria, for example, the immune system can become so over-activated that the resulting inflammatory response and its consequences can quickly lead to death. Scientists from the Medical University of Vienna and Max F. Perutz Laboratories of MedUni Vienna and the University of Vienna, supervised by Gerhard Zlabinger from the Institute of Immunology, have now demonstrated in an animal model that such an excessive response by the immune system can be modulated by targeted manipulation of the sugar metabolism to produce an immune response that efficiently eliminates the pathogens without causing any harmful secondary reactions.
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