Investigating T cell activation and tolerance in vivo: peptide challenge in allergic asthmatics

In the atopic allergic individual, challenge with allergen elicits manifestations of both the humoral (IgE-mediated or early-phase reaction) and the cell-mediated immune response (late-phase reaction). Detailed study of late-phase cell-mediated events is confounded by the effects of the earlier IgE-mediated response which results in mast cell and basophil activation. Thus the relative contributions to allergic inflammation of individual cell …