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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2014 Oct 27.
Published in final edited form as: Nat Rev Immunol. 2011 Feb 18;11(3):201–212. doi: 10.1038/nri2938

Figure 3. Regulation of phagocyte chemotaxis by autocrine and paracrine purinergic signalling mechanisms.

Figure 3

Phagocytes such as neutrophils, monocytes, and macrophages require autocrine purinergic signalling and chemoattractants (danger signals) issuing from inflamed and infected sites to detect and migrate to such danger signals. Long-range signals such as fMLP, IL-8 and other chemoattractants promote the recruitment of phagocytes to affected tissues. ATP that is released from target cells is short lived and can thus only serves as a short-range signal that regulates the final encounter of phagocytes with the target cells. At this stage, ATP released from target cells entraps phagocytes by interfering with the autocrine purinergic signalling mechanisms (see Fig. 3), by promoting random migration, and by upregulating phagocytosis and other phagocyte killing mechanisms that result in effective clearance of target cells.