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Immunology

Immunology studies the immune system and its role in both health and disease, from autoimmune disorders to anti-infectious and antitumour responses. Advances in immune modulation are opening the way to targeted solutions for complex immune-mediated diseases. Together with oncology, this is one of the best-represented fields among the projects to which Inovarion has contributed.

A significant part of this work belongs to fundamental immunology and concerns intracellular trafficking and antigen presentation. Inovarion has contributed to studying the role of the aminopeptidase IRAP in T-cell receptor signalling from endosomes, in antigen cross-presentation by dendritic cells, in phagosome maturation and in Fcγ-receptor function. These endocytosis and endosomal-signalling mechanisms, long underestimated, now appear decisive both for the T-cell response and for antibody-dependent cytotoxicity.

A second body of work addresses humoral immunity and B-cell memory: the maturation and persistence of responses against SARS-CoV-2[10], messenger-RNA vaccination, long-term memory against smallpox[8], and the mechanisms of relapse in immune thrombocytopenia after rituximab treatment — where resistant splenic memory B cells sustain recurrences. This work relies on B-cell receptor repertoire analysis and germinal-centre tracking.

Other work concerns autoimmunity — myasthenia gravis (the role of the thymus, oestrogens and the IL-23/Th17 pathway), systemic lupus erythematosus (PD-L1- and IL-4-expressing basophils, T follicular helper cells[5], lupus nephritis[4]), juvenile dermatomyositis[2] — as well as the resolution of inflammation and macrophage biology (the ChemR23/resolvin axis, the GPS2/SMRT coregulators[9], Kupffer cells). Mast cells are also studied (the role of the TET2 enzyme in immune tolerance and mastocytosis), as are the interfaces between immunity and coagulation, with the regulation of factor X by pentraxin-2. A recurring thread, type I interferon, runs through several of these studies.

This research draws on flow cytometry (spectral and mass), single-cell sequencing, immunohistochemistry and digital pathology, agonist monoclonal antibodies, spatial transcriptomics and gene editing (CRISPRi). Experimental models range from patient cohorts (lupus, myasthenia, COVID-19) to knock-out mice and patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). This work has been published in Cell, Immunity, Nature Communications, Science Advances and Science Translational Medicine.

This presence across the whole spectrum — from the molecular machinery of the immune cell through to autoimmune diseases and vaccine responses — reflects the diversity of the projects entrusted to Inovarion, which places this command of immune analysis, from fundamental mechanism to clinical application, at its partners’ disposal.

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Representative publications

  1. Sayegh et al. Defective autophagy in CD4 T cells drives liver fibrosis via type 3 inflammation. Nature Communications, 2025. Record → · PubMed
  2. Tragin et al. Muscle Spatial Transcriptomic Reveals Heterogeneous Profiles in Juvenile Dermatomyositis and Persistence of Abnormal Signature After Remission. Cells, 2025. Record → · PubMed
  3. Folmont et al. Targeting Aggressive Prostate Carcinoma Cells with Mesothelin-CAR-T Cells. Biomedicines, 2025. Record → · PubMed
  4. Simon et al. Immune characterization of lupus nephritis patients undergoing dialysis. J Transl Autoimmun, 2025. Record → · PubMed
  5. Tchen et al. PD-L1- and IL-4-expressing basophils promote pathogenic accumulation of T follicular helper cells in lupus. Nature Communications, 2024. Record → · PubMed
  6. Hidaoui et al. Targeting heterochromatin eliminates chronic myelomonocytic leukemia malignant stem cells through reactivation of retroelements and immune pathways. Commun Biol, 2024. Record → · PubMed
  7. Willis et al. Multi-Institutional Evaluation of Pathologists’ Assessment Compared to Immunoscore. Cancers (Basel), 2023. Record → · PubMed
  8. Chappert et al. Human anti-smallpox long-lived memory B cells are defined by dynamic interactions in the splenic niche and long-lasting germinal center imprinting. Immunity, 2022. Record → · PubMed
  9. Huang et al. The corepressors GPS2 and SMRT control enhancer and silencer remodeling via eRNA transcription during inflammatory activation of macrophages. Molecular Cell, 2021. Record → · PubMed
  10. Sokal et al. Maturation and persistence of the anti-SARS-CoV-2 memory B cell response. Cell, 2021. Record → · PubMed