Immunology of Ageing

Immunity protects the host against infection, but becomes dysregulated with increasing age and can be a dangerous ally. Older adults tend to respond less well to infections but at the same time suffer more immunopathology. Better understanding of age-related changes to immunity will lead to more appropriate interventions to enhance protective immunity and at the same time reduce immunopathology. To this end, this chapter briefly overviews what is known about the processes leading to human immunosenescence, considering age-associated changes to innate and adaptive immunity and their clinical consequences.