Dendritic Cells Increase T-Cell Count

For those interested in promoting a healthy immune system and increasing dendritic cells or raising low T-cell counts, you might find some benefits to adding or increasing plain-jane white button mushrooms to your routine diet. Your immune system function will thank you.

White Button Mushrooms, T-Cells, & Dendritic Cells

A recent study published in The Journal of Nutrition found the following:

"White Button Mushrooms promote the maturation of dendritic cells, enhancing immune function and increasing T-cell count, the white blood cells that protect the body from harmful microbial invaders. Adding these earthy-tasting [mushrooms] to your diet can strengthen your immune response and may even help guard against tumor development."

Dendritic Cells?

For those that don't know what dendritic cells are they are cells which "are potent antigen presenting cells (APCs) that possess the ability to stimulate naïve T cells... they are critical for the induction of T-cell responses resulting in cell-mediated immunity (CMI)." This means that for T-cells to work properly the dendritic cells must fully develop so that they can stimulate the T-cells resulting in a better working immune response system and increased white T cell count..

For those that don't typically cook with white button mushrooms just think about dicing them up with your onions and garlic when you saute veggies for sauces and sides. It's really easy and it gives you a nice flavor as well. :)

Dendritic Cells Strengthen Immune System Response

There are additional vegetable methods to increasing immune system response. Try adding your raw crushed garlic to your recipe at the end of cooking rather than the beginning to take advantage of all it's immune system benefits.

Additionally there are significant clinical findings which show that you can increase immune response greatly if you simply beat depression . It definitely behooves you to keep a positive outlook in any and all situations

Update 8/5/09: I have recently posted an additional dietary method for increasing T-Cell count with selenium, which has been studied by the University of Miami and published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. This in addition to eating more mushrroms may help slightly in improving HIV T cell count when proper medical treatment is also followed.  Check it out!

Update 11/12/09: This post has received a fair amount of traffic over the last few months and I have come to realize that this post really only covers half of the process of Increasing T Cell count. Not only that but it makes the process of activating T Cells seem quite easy to do. I recently added a new post to the archives which describes the other half of the process. The half where science really is still experimenting and trying to understand how T-cell function works, how to manipulate it, and how to fix it. The second half of the T cell activation process is important to understand. Check it out.

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Source
Best Life, Aug 2008
Journal of the Royal College Surgeons of Edinburgh
http://www.rcsed.ac.uk/Journal/vol46_1/4610003.htm
The Journal of Nutrition