A review of the current knowledge of mucosal immune response development indicates that migration of immunocytes to mucosal surfaces is an early event during fetal life. The morphologic development of gut-associated lymphoid tissues (lymphoid folicles, Peyer's patches and tonsils) occurs from 11- 20 weeks' gestation upwards. But they are active only after birth, when usually antigenic challenge takes place. The complete development of secretory immunity is a postnatal achievement. In infancy, some environmental factors such as feeding and oral antigenic challenge seems to modulate immune response development. Breastfeeding, by means of antiinfectious, antiinflammatory and immunomodulating properties, besides completing infant secretory immunity, also stimulates immunological maturation on mucosal surfaces.
Impact factor
The Impact Factor measures the average number of citations received in a particular year by papers published in the journal during the two preceding years.
© Clarivate Analytics, Journal Citation Reports 2022
Impact factor 2023
2.8
Citescore 2023
5.6
SJR
SRJ is a prestige metric based on the idea that not all citations are the same. SJR uses a similar algorithm as the Google page rank; it provides a quantitative and qualitative measure of the journal's impact.
See moreSJR 2023
0.76
SNIP
SNIP measures contextual citation impact by wighting citations based on the total number of citations in a subject field.
See moreSNIP 2023
1.09
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