Grant: Project Grant

Neutrophils are the most abundant white blood cells in humans. During the beginning phase of inflammation, due to microbial infection, neutrophils migrate toward the site of inflammation and play a key role against invading pathogens. We identified a human subpopulation of long-lived neutrophils involved in the resolution phase of inflammation. These cells present many characteristics distinct from their circulatory blood counterparts, including a unique metabolism associated with the expression of mitochondria-associated genes. This project proposes to characterize these long-lived neutrophils in terms of their metabolism as well as their functional role in inflammatory diseases. Understanding the unique metabolism of the long-lived pro-resolutive neutrophils and describing their suppressive functions will provide a better understanding of the processes involved in the resolution of inflammation. Characterization and scheming neutrophils towards cells with a pro-resolution phenotype could represent new ways for clinical prediction and therapeutic intervention in chronic inflammatory diseases in which neutrophils predominate.