The Innate Immune System: Its Rediscovery before Toll Was Described

In 1994, in a prospective control trial in cyclosporine-treated,
kidneytransplant patients, we observed that treatment of a
non-specificallograft injury (postischemic reperfusion injury)
leads to asignificant reduction in the incidence of both
specificalloimmune-mediated allograft rejection and chronic
allograft failure. From these convincing clinical data, we
concluded in terms of an‘argumentum e contrario’: it is the tissue
injury that induces immunity. As from where we stand today in
innate immunity research, these earlyclinical observations can be
regarded as the discovery of the existence of a human innate immune
system activated by tissue injury and precedingadaptive immunity.