Journal of Clinical and Cellular Immunology
Open Access

Abstract

Apoptosis and the Developing T Cells

Carolina Francelin and Liana Verinaud

Efficient TCR repertoire selection in the thymus is critical for immune function, ensuring the production of functional MHC-restricted and self-tolerant T cells. T cell education in the thymus involves positive and negative selection processes where apoptosis play an especially important role in eliminating useless or potentially dangerous thymocytes. For decades, positive and negative selection in T cell development has attracted the attention and considerable research has been conducted to improve our understanding of how ligand induced signaling through the T cell receptor (TCR) can lead to both: rescue from death in the case of positive selection and death in the case of negative selection. In this brief report, we review the basic concepts involved in the extrinsic and intrinsic pathway of apoptosis, and provide an overview of the events that leads immature T cells to survive or die by apoptosis during their intrathymic development.