A publication by Song and colleagues identifies a unique lymphatic drainage system that connects the posterior of the eye with deep cervical lymph nodes (dCLNs) and the meningeal lymphatic network. In several different mouse models, they show that vaccines delivered to the posterior of the eye can specifically induce immune responses in the central nervous system (CNS) and protect against experimental viral and bacterial CNS infection. The posterior of the eye can also be targeted to deliver therapeutic vaccines to treat established brain tumours. Moreover, the authors show that specific inhibition of lymphatic drainage can prevent unwanted immune responses to an adenoviral vector in the context of repeated administration of an approved gene therapy for retinal dystrophy. These findings demonstrate that the eye is an accessible and versatile target to modulate immune responses in many different contexts.

Song 及其同事发表的一篇论文确定了一种独特的淋巴引流系统，该系统将眼睛后部与颈深淋巴结 (dCLN) 和脑膜淋巴网络连接起来。在几种不同的小鼠模型中，他们表明，输送到眼睛后部的疫苗可以特异性诱导中枢神经系统（CNS）中的免疫反应，并防止实验性病毒和细菌中枢神经系统感染。还可以针对眼睛后部提供治疗性疫苗来治疗已形成的脑肿瘤。此外，作者表明，在重复施用已批准的视网膜营养不良基因疗法的情况下，特异性抑制淋巴引流可以防止对腺病毒载体产生不必要的免疫反应。这些发现表明，眼睛是在许多不同情况下调节免疫反应的可及且多功能的靶点。