• Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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    11 months ago

    Yes, looks like there have been multiple significant recent advancements in understanding how they function and the subtypes of eosinophil cells there are, curious about something in particular?

    This article is interesting about the recent interest in determining the makeup of esinophils and how they affect various processes in the body and organs.

    https://f1000research.com/articles/6-1084

    • JoshuaSlowpoke777@lemmy.worldOP
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      11 months ago

      So, a certain edutainment manga/anime (Cells at Work) initially depicted eosinophils as “kinda sucking at fighting things that aren’t parasites, but excelling at flatlining parasites”. How did we go from that interpretation, to recent papers on COVID patients turning up with oddly high eosinophil counts?

      • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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        11 months ago

        Oh cool. I just like reading articles myself, but this is usually how new things are researched. They go over all the things they know and then try to figure out more about the things they don’t fully understand yet, and even understanding a small part of something better could mean a cell or organ has a completely new function nobody had guessed at before.

        Rather than “this organ or cell does this” we keep learning that things are even more interconnected than we thought, like your gut health can affect your hormones or the appendix being thought vestigial and now is thought to be pretty important in gut health and the immune system.

        I’ll also say that in pop media, you’ll often find simplifications of many processes just so that you can learn the most salient aspect of a topic that is relevant to the story rather than iterating every known facet and risk becoming pedantic or slowing the story.

  • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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    11 months ago

    Oh I forgot to answer why they’re looking into these cells more acutely.

    Apparently they’ll be able to treat disorders more accurately by virtue of identifying new therapeutic agents the more they know about how eosinophil cells function.