Description
The human body is like an exceedingly well-fortified castle, defended by billions of soldiers – some live for less than a day, others remember battles for decades, but all are essential in protecting us from disease. This hidden army is our immune system, and without it we could not survive the eternal war between us and our microscopic enemies. Hidden Army explores the incredible arsenal that lives within us – how it knows what to attack and what to defend, and how it kills everything from the common cold to the plague bacterium. We see what happens when the immune system turns on us, and conversely how impossible life is without its protection. We learn how diseases try to evade the immune system, how they exploit vulnerabilities and even subvert it to their own advantage, and we discover how scientists are designing new drugs to harness the power of the system to advance medicine in the 21st century. Some of the topics explored include why are so many people allergic to cats, but so few to hamsters? Do transplants ever reject their new bodies? What is pus? How does your body develop new weapons for new enemies? Why is cancer so hard for our immune system to fight? How does our immune system remember? Why did the 1918 flu pandemic kill mainly young, healthy people? Why did the 2009 swine flu outbreak lead to a spike in sleep disorders? Can we smell someone else’s immune system? And does that help us subconsciously decide who we fall in love with? Hidden Army provides an entertaining, intriguing and accessible account of the body’s defenses against disease. Drawing on everything from ancient Egyptian medical texts to cutting-edge medical science, the book takes readers on an adventure packed with weird and wonderful facts about their own defense mechanisms, making this both informative and great fun to read. Catherine Carver Preface: Our hidden army 1. Full frontal immunity: The first line of defence 2. A cast of cut-throats: The killer cells that keep us safe 3. Chit-chatting chemicals: How your immune system yells 4. Transplants: Designer vaginas to pig heart perfection 5. Outnumbered: How the immune system manages the body’s resident bacteria 6. Immunological tango: Sex and love 7. What a cute parasite: Pregnancy and the immune system 8. A palace for parasites: Worms and fleas and ticks! Oh my! 9. The adaptive assassins: Killing everything from pink-eye to plague 10. Vaccines: A triumph of man’s manipulation of the immune system 11. Allergies: Everything you’re itching to know 12. Auto-immunity: The science of friendly fire 13. Defenceless: The boy who lived in a bubble 14. Cancer: A deadly spot the difference 15. Killer bugs: Be afraid, be very afraid 16. Clever drugs: Immunological alchemy
