Question

In a famous science fiction movie, a group of scientists in a submarine are miniaturized and injected into a patient's bloodstream. Their mission is to travel to the patient's brain and remove a blood clot that has caused the patient to become comatose. During their journey to the brain, the shrunken scientists encounter many of the structures discussed in this lesson and have some dangerous encounters with them. They have to move quickly to avoid being attacked by the patient's immune system, which recognizes them as foreign objects. For this discussion, imagine yourself as one of these scientists. Respond to the following questions from the viewpoint of traveling through a patient's bloodstream in a miniaturized submarine.

1. What type of blood cell would pose the greatest threat to you? Explain the reason for your choice.
2.Imagine that your miniaturized submarine is attacked by a defensive blood cell. Write a short description about the specific type of blood cell that includes its appearance and the attack.
3. Besides the defensive blood cells, what other threats would you face from the patient's immune system? Describe a few structures that would attempt to destroy you and the way they would attempt to do this.

Answer 1

The greatest risk will be posed by monocytes, a type of WBC. It is the largest type of WBC that is phagocytic in nature and kill the invading foreign pathogen. They also stimulates helper T Cells which in turn helps to provide stronger immune response. 2. The cell that is known to attack and engulf foreign pathogen is monocyte. On arrival of pathogen, it changes into phaogocyte. These are the largest white blood cells that have rounded appearance and kidney shaped nucleus. Their cytoplasm is rich in lysosomes and without granules. 3. Other threats from immune cells is antibodies which are produced by lymphocytes. Lymphocytes are one class of WBCs that produce antibodies. These antibodies attach to pathogen and present it to the phagocytic cells of immune system. They also signal other immune cells about the presence of pathogen.

Answer 2

1) I would choose white blood cells since their main job is to fight infection (Something that does not belong as a part of the body) But since their is several types of white blood cells the ones too look out for would be the Neutrophils since they kill bacteria by ingesting them.

2) It would be a Neutrophils blood cell. They are 12-14 µm diameter, and so look bigger than the surrounding red blood cells. There is a single nucleus, which is multilobed, and can have between 2 and 5 lobes.

3)You would also have to watch out for: Granulocytes – cells which contain granules which contain chemicals that are used to kill bacteria and viruses Lymphocytes- cells which attack most of the bacterial and viral infections in our bodiesMonocytes - cells which become macrophages, large cells that engulf harmful particles in our bodies