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Host Resistance Assays
Citation:
Burleson, S., W. Freebern, F. Burleson, G. Burleson, V. Johnson, AND R. Luebke. Host Resistance Assays. Edition 1, Chapter 10, Jamie Dewitt, Cheryl Rockwell, and Christal Bowman (ed.), Immunotoxicity Testing: Methods and Protocols. Humana Press Incorporated, Totowa, NJ, 1803(1):117-145, (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-8549-4_9
Impact/Purpose:
The book chapter describes and reviews viral, bacterial and parasitic host resistance assays and their use in assessing effects of environmental chemicals and drugs on the immune system. The chapter provides basic information to help laboratory practitioners select appropriate models and more general information that risk assessors will find useful in interpreting published work.
Description:
Introduction: Host resistance assays, the gold standard of immunotoxicity testing, are a powerful approach to evaluate global functional capacity in a fully interactive immune system. Host resistance assays based on the clearance of a replicating infectious agent provide a critical overview of how well the innate, adaptive, and homeostatic regulatory immune functions are integrated to protect the host. Both comprehensive as well as targeted host resistance assays are available, each with distinct purposes. Comprehensive host resistance models, used to determine whether an immunotoxic effect is present, and targeted host resistance models, designed to addresses mechanistic questions pertaining to the immunological armamentarium, provide valuable insight into the complexity surrounding the effect of dose on the induction of a protective immune state. The sections that follow describe host resistance models based on challenge with viruses, bacteria and parasites. Each provides an overview of how the various assays may be used, along with a summary of procedures.
