Alexander Entwistle

19/11/07

How Does Our Body Deal With Pathogens?

Pathogens are micro-organisms, which in their search for food and shelter cause disease. Part of the job of our human defence system is to prevent these from entering our bodies, and to this effect our skin produces a variety of substance harmful to pathogens for example, our sweat contains lactic acid and the enzyme lysozyme. urthermore, many of our orifices are protected by fluids and mucus, our blood clots and the cilia in our respiratory tract help us to remove unwanted particles. !ome of these hostile intruders do successfully get through, despite all these measures. "cid in various parts of our bodies manages to kill most of these, however this is not always enough. #onetheless, thanks to our body$s %&mmune !ystem$, we are still often able to deal with these pathogens' comprising may different cells and tissues, this complex system allows us to resist many potentially fatal infections. (ur body$s immune response is split into two forms' specific, which is targeted against an individual type of micro-organism, and non-specific. )he former consists of cells and antibodies *cell-mediated and humoral immunity+, and the latter phagocytosis and inflammation. &nflammation, triggered by damaged cells releasing %alarm chemicals$ *e.g. histamine+, causes blood vessels to dilate. ,lood flow therefore increases. )his causes the standard symptoms of inflammation, such as redness, heat and swelling, but also prevents the infection from spreading, increases the speed of the healing process and %alarms$ the rest of the immune system. )hese chemicals also attract the white blood cells that conduct phagocytosis *a process where neutrophils and monocytes engulf pathogens, taking them into vacuoles inside their cytoplasm and subse-uently digesting them with lytic enzymes+. &n %humoral immunity$, antibodies attack bacteria and virus before they actually enter other cells. )hese antibodies are produced by , cells *, lymphocytes+, a type of white blood cell produced in bone marrow. %.ell-mediated immunity$ involved cells directly attacking pathogens. )hese activated ) cells *) lymphocytes+ mostly destroy affected body cells to limit the spreading of the pathogen. )hese affected cells are in effect %collateral damage$. "fter the %invasion$ has been successfully dealt with, some of these %) cells$ become %memory cells$. )hese remain in the body ready for the same type of pathogen to attack. /accinations work in a similar way they contain some form of the pathogen, thus stimulating the development of memory cells so that the body is prepared to efficiently and -uickly destroy the real pathogen.