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In Defense of Self: How the Immune System Really Works
We live in a sea of seething microbial predators, an infinity of invisible and invasive microorganisms capable of setting up shop inside us and sending us to an early grave. The only thing keeping them out? The immune system.
William Clark's In Defense of Self offers a refreshingly accessible tour of the immune system, putting in layman's terms essential information that has been for too long the exclusive province of trained specialists. Clark explains how the immune system works by using powerful genetic, chemical, and cellular weapons to protect us from the vast majority of disease-causing microbes-bacteria, viruses, molds, and parasites. Only those microbes our bodies need to help us digest food and process vitamins are admitted. But this same system can endanger us by rejecting potentially life-saving organ transplants, or by overreacting and turning too much force against foreign invaders, causing serious--occasionally lethal--collateral damage to our tissues and resulting in autoimmune disease. In Defense of Self covers everything from how antibodies work and the strategies the body uses to distinguish self from not self to the nature of immunological memory, the latest approaches to vaccination,
and how the immune system will react should we ever be subjected to a bioterrorist attack. Clark also offers important insights on the vital role that the immune system plays in cancer, AIDS, autoimmunity, rheumatoid arthritis, allergies and asthma, and other diseases.
Of special interest to all those suffering from diseases related to the immune system, as well as their families, In Defense of Self lucidly explains a system none of us could live without.
William Clark's In Defense of Self offers a refreshingly accessible tour of the immune system, putting in layman's terms essential information that has been for too long the exclusive province of trained specialists. Clark explains how the immune system works by using powerful genetic, chemical, and cellular weapons to protect us from the vast majority of disease-causing microbes-bacteria, viruses, molds, and parasites. Only those microbes our bodies need to help us digest food and process vitamins are admitted. But this same system can endanger us by rejecting potentially life-saving organ transplants, or by overreacting and turning too much force against foreign invaders, causing serious--occasionally lethal--collateral damage to our tissues and resulting in autoimmune disease. In Defense of Self covers everything from how antibodies work and the strategies the body uses to distinguish self from not self to the nature of immunological memory, the latest approaches to vaccination,
and how the immune system will react should we ever be subjected to a bioterrorist attack. Clark also offers important insights on the vital role that the immune system plays in cancer, AIDS, autoimmunity, rheumatoid arthritis, allergies and asthma, and other diseases.
Of special interest to all those suffering from diseases related to the immune system, as well as their families, In Defense of Self lucidly explains a system none of us could live without.
265 pages, Paperback
First published February 4, 2007
15 people are currently reading
121 people want to read
About the author
William R. Clark
37 books6 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name. This profile may contain books from multiple authors of this name.
Other authors publishing under this name are:
William R. Clark
William R. Clark
William R. Clark is Professor Emeritus of Immunology in the Department of Molecular, Cell and Developmental Biology at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the author of a number of books about biology, immunology, and evolution, including Sex and the Origins of Death, A Means to an End: The Biological Basis of Aging and Death, and The New Healers: The Promise and Problems of Molecular Medicine in the Twenty-First Century.
Other authors publishing under this name are:
William R. Clark
William R. Clark
William R. Clark is Professor Emeritus of Immunology in the Department of Molecular, Cell and Developmental Biology at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the author of a number of books about biology, immunology, and evolution, including Sex and the Origins of Death, A Means to an End: The Biological Basis of Aging and Death, and The New Healers: The Promise and Problems of Molecular Medicine in the Twenty-First Century.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
May 24, 2020
Our bodies are pretty amazing and as with all the systems that we embody, the immune system is mind-blowing. The reason for me to pick this book is the ongoing CoViD-19 pandemic and to have a basic understanding of how the immune system works. I knew the functions of the immune system at a broader level and wanted to understand the intricacies of it. This book provides a great biological explainer of it for beginners.
The book starts off with the different cells involved in the immune system and how they communicate with each other when there is an intruder in the body. Be aware that it can get a little technical here. I found it a little hard to remember all the terminologies related to the cells' functions. The book has some neat illustrations on different types of antibodies, how T cells (one of the important cells to instigate an inflammatory response) understand there is an intruder and how they communicate with B cells to produce antibodies. I got a basic understanding of the different types of immunity - innate and adaptive.
Apart from the basic biology of how the system works, the book also talks about vaccinations and how they mount an immune response in the body. The author discusses examples of various vaccines that are already available and goes on to explain why it is difficult to make vaccines for diseases like HIV and malaria. There is also a chapter on cancer and how our immune systems despite being so vigilant and clever, fail to detect it. The most interesting part of the book for me was the topic of autoimmune diseases. The author made a great attempt in explaining how our immune systems can go on an overdrive and attack itself. This kind of autoimmune response can lead to conditions like allergy and asthma to more serious disorders like Type-1 diabetes and lupus. The next most interesting topic was organ transplants and why our bodies reject it. It is again the immune system, which has learned through millions of years of evolution to protect us by detecting pathogens and attacking them, now encountering the 60-year old medical marvel of an organ transplant, detects it as an outsider and attacks the newcomer, producing a similar response to when we are attacked by any pathogen. The book ends with bioterrorism where the author discusses the past accounts of misuse of microbes to spread diseases during a war. This was a little spooky, given the current pandemic. Although, on a side note, it is time and again shown by scientists that CoViD-19 is NOT a bio-weapon!
I liked this book overall and might go back to it to refer the topics again. It took some time for me to connect the dots and form an overall picture of the immune response. I felt a little disengaged at a few places where the author mentions a new terminology and refers it to be discussed in a future chapter which made it difficult for me to go back and forth. Despite the few caveats, I recommend this to anyone who is intrigued about the workings of the human body in general or to anyone who wants to understand the intricacies of the immune system.
The book starts off with the different cells involved in the immune system and how they communicate with each other when there is an intruder in the body. Be aware that it can get a little technical here. I found it a little hard to remember all the terminologies related to the cells' functions. The book has some neat illustrations on different types of antibodies, how T cells (one of the important cells to instigate an inflammatory response) understand there is an intruder and how they communicate with B cells to produce antibodies. I got a basic understanding of the different types of immunity - innate and adaptive.
Apart from the basic biology of how the system works, the book also talks about vaccinations and how they mount an immune response in the body. The author discusses examples of various vaccines that are already available and goes on to explain why it is difficult to make vaccines for diseases like HIV and malaria. There is also a chapter on cancer and how our immune systems despite being so vigilant and clever, fail to detect it. The most interesting part of the book for me was the topic of autoimmune diseases. The author made a great attempt in explaining how our immune systems can go on an overdrive and attack itself. This kind of autoimmune response can lead to conditions like allergy and asthma to more serious disorders like Type-1 diabetes and lupus. The next most interesting topic was organ transplants and why our bodies reject it. It is again the immune system, which has learned through millions of years of evolution to protect us by detecting pathogens and attacking them, now encountering the 60-year old medical marvel of an organ transplant, detects it as an outsider and attacks the newcomer, producing a similar response to when we are attacked by any pathogen. The book ends with bioterrorism where the author discusses the past accounts of misuse of microbes to spread diseases during a war. This was a little spooky, given the current pandemic. Although, on a side note, it is time and again shown by scientists that CoViD-19 is NOT a bio-weapon!
I liked this book overall and might go back to it to refer the topics again. It took some time for me to connect the dots and form an overall picture of the immune response. I felt a little disengaged at a few places where the author mentions a new terminology and refers it to be discussed in a future chapter which made it difficult for me to go back and forth. Despite the few caveats, I recommend this to anyone who is intrigued about the workings of the human body in general or to anyone who wants to understand the intricacies of the immune system.
May 26, 2011
A very approachable book that gets into technical details about the immune system. It's a little out of date (specifically in terms if PVC vaccine) but still a good resource for those curious about how immunity works.
February 7, 2015
Great book for prospective doctors
Great introduction to the immune system for an undergraduate in premedical field or anybody interested in how the immune system works. The book covers topics such as cancer, allergies, vaccinations, and bioterrorism, to list a few. Probably won't be much more than a refresher for MDs.
Great introduction to the immune system for an undergraduate in premedical field or anybody interested in how the immune system works. The book covers topics such as cancer, allergies, vaccinations, and bioterrorism, to list a few. Probably won't be much more than a refresher for MDs.
October 6, 2018
For whatever reason, I don't put textbooks on goodreads, so I was torn about whether to add this one. I did technically have to read it as a textbook, and it is full of scientific explanations on how the immune system works. However, it covers a lot more than that, dabbling in vaccines, bioterrorism, and organ rejection, all with a refreshing light tone and fun analogies that won me over.
June 30, 2015
A few parts were boring to me and I skipped them, but most of it was really interesting and informative. The last hard science class I took was 10 years ago in Junior year of high school. Biology I haven't taken since I was 14.
Fascinating stuff!
Fascinating stuff!
September 8, 2011
A very good book about how the immune system works. The language is easy to understand, and its coverage of the relevant topics is very comprehensive.
April 18, 2020
Very scientific but very clear explanation how immune system works on micro level. Good basis for understanding of more complicated things.
April 20, 2021
This is a great introduction to the immune system. The writing style is clear and—honestly—rollicking. And it's an actual science book! What I mean is, it trusts that the science itself is interesting, and uses that as its source of propulsion. Writers of "popular" science, whether academics or not, tend to have a low opinion of the laity. So they fill their books with how "it was a crisp autumn morning when Pasteur walked through the streets, thinking about the day's experiments," and so on. None of that here. Clark trusts that the mysteries and logical puzzles of the immune system are interesting in themselves. Great!
May 23, 2022
Highly recommend this, probably as good as it gets for introducing concepts and historical context to the science of immunology
May 9, 2025
A concise, intermediate-level dive into the immune system.
December 6, 2024
this is a textbook for my immunology class i’m mainly logging it for the yearly reading challenge 🤷♀️
May 13, 2025
This isn't a textbook on the immune system, but the details covered can still be a little overwhelming to someone new to this area (as I was). The first 60 pages are a crash course on how the immune system work. Each chapter of the remaining 160 pages is devoted to a specific topic, for example, autoimmune diseases or HIV. The author is a very good writer and had this been a lighter topic, I'm sure I would have read the book much faster. I'm glad I read this book before tackling a book with more details.
Note that I believe (and follow) the meanings Goodreads gives for what each number of stars means. Therefore, the majority of my ratings are 3 stars ("liked it").
Note that I believe (and follow) the meanings Goodreads gives for what each number of stars means. Therefore, the majority of my ratings are 3 stars ("liked it").
July 27, 2021
I was assigned this book as supplemental reading for my Immunology lecture at my university and was surprised how much I enjoyed the book. I genuinely believe I learned more from this book than I did from my professor. It covers a lot of topics in biology/ medicine and if you are pre-med or just interested in the human body in general this is a great book to look into. Clark is very good at explaining and describing complex topics and mechanisms (even for people without a strong science background).
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews