An Elegant Defense: The Extraordinary New Science of the Immune System: A Tale in Four Lives

by Matt Richtel

thought him sinful. By 1977, Bob lived in Washington, D.C., now an accomplished lawyer—assistant general counsel for a major federal office, the General

Meanwhile, there’s another twist: About 8 percent of our genetic material was formed from retroviruses. That means we’ve mingled with these viruses and they’ve become part of us, to the point that they can be not only helpful but essential. An example is the placenta, which may have evolved from a retrovirus in such a way that it helped enable the transmission and sharing of material between mother and child.

The line that the immune system must walk is a tightrope over an abyss, with death to the left and the right.

The antibody-encoding genes are unlike all other normal genes.

An individual’s elegant defense didn’t care simply about the infection; it cared about the infection when it attacked its own personal habitat. Italicized because it’s a key scientific insight.

Ideas, memes, can elicit a kind of autoimmune response, an overreaction that feels protective initially but can ultimately prove counterproductive and make it harder to find truth. (On the other hand, kudos to immunology

The story of the immune system became the story of homeostasis—a state of harmony or stability. This

Dr. Migueles said that intensive study of HIV has helped develop “a flow chart of the multiplicity of relationships” in how the immune system cascade works. “That’s where the treasure chest is.”

Remember that inflammation is the body’s own response to disease. Inflammation is not “other.” It is “self.”

But adaptation is not the same thing as evolution. Adaptation involves responding to the environment within the limits of individual physical capacities. To take a random example: If you learn that you are more likely to catch a bird if you hunt at dawn, you will wake up early and go hunting. You are adapting to your environment.

This, he said, was obviously not true. But that’s how I perceived it, and I and many others tend to make the same mistake. “What happens today is that many people are living with imaginary bears at every step of their lives—something in the news or around the bend is going to get them.” What followed was what he called a “norepinephrine high.”

health. I wasn’t going to stop until I had a better understanding of what was consistent with me. I had long moved past questions like what I

I can still picture one night when I was lying in bed, breathing deeply, and I kept meditating. An hour, more than an hour. I felt my jaw go slack. I felt my body calm. I fell asleep. I woke up in the morning rested—genuinely rested. Feeling different than I had in a long, long time. I kept doing it. Many nights, it would take an hour or more, maybe two.

During this period, I scoured every corner of my brain and began to realize the wisdom of the old adage that there is little to fear except fear itself. Looking back, I can see a close association between the end of my psychological probing and the beginning of my period of meditation and relaxation. I had, in plain terms, given myself permission to relax. I’d become somewhat comfortable, and then eventually, I had nothing to prove. I’d learned, the hard way, to let myself listen to me, first and foremost, and to suppress the voices of others. It is also impossible to overstate, as it speaks

Cell division is a must. Mutation, cancer, is a by-product of cell division. It is one reason your death is preordained. This dynamic, though, also holds the keys to combating cancer. That’s what Allison began to exploit with CTLA-4. A second major conceptual discovery has helped tinker with the immune system to turn the odds in favor of life.