Sebastian Amigorena is an Argentine immunologist and a Team Leader at the

Institut Curie Centre of protontherapy Institut Curie is a medical, biological and biophysical research centre in France. It is a private non-profit foundation operating a research center on biophysics, cell biology and oncology and a hospital specialized in ...

Education and career

Sebastian Amigorena was born in 1960 in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

. He studied biochemistry at

Paris Diderot University Paris Diderot University, also known as Paris 7 (), was a French university located in Paris, France. It was one of the inheritors of the historic University of Paris, which was split into 13 universities in 1970. Paris Diderot merged with Pari ...

, earning his Ph.D. in 1990 under the supervision of Wolf H. Fridman, with a thesis titled "FcR expression in B lymphocytes". He then went on to a

postdoctoral fellowship A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary academ ...

in the laboratory of Ira Mellman at

Yale Medical School The Yale School of Medicine is the medical school of Yale University, a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. It was founded in 1810 as the Medical Institution of Yale College and formally opened in 1813. It is the sixth-oldest m ...

. In 1995, he joined the faculty of the Institut Curie as a team leader, and is now director of the laboratory of Immunity and Cancer. He was elected to the

French Academy of Sciences The French Academy of Sciences (, ) is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific method, scientific research. It was at the forefron ...

in 2005.

Research

Amigorena's research focuses on

antigen presentation Antigen presentation is a vital immune process that is essential for T cell immune response triggering. Because T cells recognize only fragmented antigens displayed on cell surfaces, antigen processing must occur before the antigen fragment can ...

dendritic cell A dendritic cell (DC) is an antigen-presenting cell (also known as an ''accessory cell'') of the mammalian immune system. A DC's main function is to process antigen material and present it on the cell surface to the T cells of the immune system ...

s. In particular, Amigorena's research group has studied the processes by which dendritic cells take up, process, and display antigens to

T cell T cells (also known as T lymphocytes) are an important part of the immune system and play a central role in the adaptive immune response. T cells can be distinguished from other lymphocytes by the presence of a T-cell receptor (TCR) on their cell ...

s, as well as how this process is regulated by

regulatory T cell The regulatory T cells (Tregs or Treg cells), formerly known as suppressor T cells, are a subpopulation of T cells that modulate the immune system, maintain immune tolerance, tolerance to self-antigens, and prevent autoimmune disease. Treg ...

Notable works

*Guermonprez P, Saveanu L... Amigorena S (2003). ER-phagosome fusion defines an MHC class I cross-presentation compartment in dendritic cells. ''Nature''. 425(6956): pgs. 397–402 *Thery C, Boussac M... Amigorena S (2001). Proteomic analysis of dendritic cell-derived exosomes: a secreted subcellular compartment distinct from apoptotic vesicles. ''Journal of Immunology''. 166(12): pgs. 7309–7318 *Regnault A, Lankar D... Amigorena S (1999). Fcy receptor-mediated induction of dendritic cell maturation and major histocompatibility complex class I-restricted antigen presentation after immuno complex internalization. ''Journal of Experimental Medicine''. 189(2): pgs. 371–380 *Thery C, Regnault A... Amigorena S (1999). Molecular characterization of dendritic cell-derived exosomes: selective accumulation of the heat shock protein hsc73. ''Journal of Cell Biology''. 147(3): pgs. 599–610 *Zitvogel L, Regnault A... Amigorena S (1998). Eradication of established murine tumors using a novel cell-free vaccine: dendritic cell-derived exosomes. ''Nature Medicine''. 4(5): pgs. 594-600

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Amorigena, Sebastian Paris Diderot University alumni Living people 1960 births