Adaptive immunity in invertebrates: a straw house without a mechanistic foundation. BioEssays 29:1138–1146

Recently claims have been made for radical new insights in the field of invertebrate immunology that involve memory, specificity and/or maternal transfer of immuno-competence. For evidence these claims rely on pheno-mena, such as survival or reproductive capacity, observed at the level of the whole organism. The allure of these apparently revelatoryhypotheses is that theyarecontrary to established views of innate immunity. They draw implicit analogy to adaptive responses in jawed verte-brates and the terminology used creates an incomplete and misleading picture. We argue that the case for adaptive immunity in invertebrates based only on such phenomena is weak and flawed, as it can only be upheld if supported by descriptions of the underlying mechanisms. We caution against a reliance on this approach as a means of advancing this field—high-lighting, as an example, some negative commercial implications of adopting this approach. BioEssay