[The significance of immunology for man--intervention and change].

Classical immunological research has been mainly devoted to natural defense mechanisms against infections and to the development and action of vaccines. With the discovery of immune tolerance and following investigations on transplantation immunity, the concept of the immune response was generalized as the higher animal's ability to discriminate between "self" and "notself". Since then research has concentrated on cells and their products involved in these immune phenomena. Application of the vast knowledge in the field of modern immunology should aid greatly in the solution of many actual clinical problems and in alleviating public health hazards (parasitology, etc.) in the Third World.