Regulatory T cells: Inspiration for artificial immune systems

Abstract

In this conceptual paper, some features of regulatory T cells are described. These cells have been receiving an increasing attention in Immunological research, due to their importance in several aspects of the immune system. As will be argued, these cells constitute an important source of inspiration for developing Artificial Immune Systems, computational tools that attempt to capture some of the characteristics of the natural immune system. It is expected that the incorporation of these cells in some immune inspired algorithms may not only lead to more biologically plausible models, but also to algorithms that can achieve better results in real-life problems. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.