Metchnikoff at Rockefeller: a legacy of phagocyte- microbial interactions

In 1909, Elie Metchnikoff presented a signed portrait of himself to Simon Flexner, the first scientific director of the newly formed Rockefeller Institute in New York. It was eventually passed on, at Rockefeller, to Rene Dubos, a French microbiologist, and then to his successors, James G Hirsch and Zanvil A Cohn; Metchnikoff’s spirit continued to pervade the laboratory directed subsequently by Ralph M Steinman. Over 50 years, 1960-2010, this became one of the premier research laboratories in the world to investigate the immune interactions of microbes with granulocytes, monocyte-macrophages and dendritic cells, respectively, at all times under the benign presence of Metchnikoff. I was fortunate to join the laboratory as a student of Zanvil Cohn during 1966-1976, which initiated me into a life-long love affair with macrophages, lasting to the present day at Oxford. In this year of his 175th birthday, I would like to record the legacy that Metchnikoff left to my generation during that period at Rockefeller University