A new study led by Elena Tomasello & Marc Dalod is out now in @natimmunol.nature.com. Through the generation of a novel system lacking plasmacytoid DCs, authors show that pDCs are dispensable or deleterious in respiratory viral infections. Congrats to 1st author Clemence Ngo and all collaborators!
www.nature.com
Previous research has suggested that pDCs are required for an effective antiviral immune response, but direct experimental evidence to support this is lacking. Here Ngo et al. develop a pDC knockin mouse model and find that pDCs are dispensable for an antiviral immune response to mouse cytomegalovirus and may be detrimental during influenza or SARS-CoV-2 infection.