Do Langerhans cells deserve a meeting on their own?
Nikolaus Romani (Innsbruck, Austria) summarized the main findings of the meeting and emphasized the importance of new tools in fostering LC research. LCs are attractive to a variety of physicians, scientists, and pharmaceutical organizations. Poised at the interface with the environment, LCs play a role in a variety of human diseases and are being studied by scientists with diverse interests.In medicine, LCs are studied by dermatologist for their role in numerous skin diseases including psoriasis, atopic dermatitis, and skin allergies. They are also studied by specialists in infectious disease, because the skin is a frequent site of infection, and by oncologists because of their role in a number of prevalent cancers such as squamous- and basal-cell carcinoma and melanoma. They are of great interest to immunologists because LCs are the most accessible nonlymphoid DC population in mice and humans, and to photobiologists because LCs are a critical target of UV-induced injuries. LCs are al
