Figure 3.

Time-courses of key immune system components as a function of days after initial viral exposure. Panel (A), fraction of the five classes of respiratory epithelial cells (healthy, latent, infected, resistant, and damaged). Initially, all cells are susceptible and healthy. A substantial fraction of the cells become infected by day 10. Afterwards, interferon renders most of the cells resistant. As the infection subsides, the cells gradually lose their resistance and become susceptible and healthy. Panels (B–E), population of interferon, antigen presenting cells, effector cells, and antibodies. Panel (F), specificity of antibodies, which increases monotonically over time.