Honours Project Book - Faculty of Health Sciences - University of ...

Reproductive Immunology Group
Contact Person
Professor Sarah Robertson
Phone: 8313 4094
sarah.robertson@adelaide.edu.au
Supervisors
Professor Sarah Robertson
Dr David Sharkey
Dr Anne Macpherson
Professor Claire Roberts
Dr Kerri Diener
Location: Medical School
Sarah Robertson is a NHMRC Senior Research Fellow and Head of the Reproductive Immunology group in the
Research Centre for Reproductive Health. Her research focus is early pregnancy, particularly the cytokine biology
and immunology of the uterus and early embryo development. Her team is made up of 6 postdocs and 5
postgraduate students, who work together to explore the importance of the peri-conceptual immune environment
in optimal embryo implantation and placental development, and programming fetal development and health after
birth.
Research in the Reproductive Immunology group centres on three related themes:
• The roles of cytokines and leukocytes in the events of embryo development during early pregnancy.
• The impact of the maternal immune response on success and quality of embryo implantation and reproductive
outcome.
• Male seminal fluid signalling in the female reproductive tract and significance for reproductive events and
immunity to sexually transmitted infection.
We seek to unravel the immune and cytokine networks of early pregnancy to understand how maternal immune
tolerance to pregnancy is established, and how failure in this process contributes to infertility, miscarriage and
pathologies of pregnancy in women. Our work also has applications in animal breeding industries where early
pregnancy loss is a significant constraint.
Keywords
Immunology, cytokines, uterus, embryo, pregnancy
PROJECT: (Basic) T-Regulatory (Treg) cells and
activiation of immune tolerance during early
pregnancy.
Theme title: Pregnancy immunology
.R. O&G.
Supervisor
Professor Sarah Robertson
Project Background
To allow embryo implantation and successful
pregnancy, the maternal immune system must
become ‘tolerant’ to paternal transplantation
antigens. Treg cells are now implicated as key cells
mediating maternal immune tolerance. Discoveries
in our laboratory show that semen plays an important
role in establishing functional tolerance to male
transplantation antigens during early pregnancy. We
now seek to investigate the role of seminal factors in
activating and expanding Treg cells in preparation
for embryo implantation. The aim of this project is to
investigate in mice the molecular events involved in
activating Treg cells after mating. In particular the
importance of seminal plasma TGFbeta and the role
of male MHC antigens in semen will be investigated.
The project will employ cytokine null mutant mouse
models, linked with state-of-the-art digital flow
cytometry (FACS), and quantitative RT-PCR for the
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