Immunogenetics Immunogenetics Immunogenetics or immungenetics is the branch of medical genetics that explores the relationship between the immune system and genetics. Autoimmune diseases, such as type 1 diabetes, are complex genetic traits which result from defects in the immune system. Identification of genes defining the immune defects may identify new target genes for therapeutic approaches. Alternatively, genetic variations can also help to define the immunological pathway leading to disease. Its origin is usually attributed to Edward Jenner, who discovered in 1796 that cowpox, or vaccinia, induced protection against human smallpox. It took two centuries before the World Health Organization announced in
Jenner Glacier vaccination. Jenner Glacier Jenner Glacier () is a glacier long flowing southwest from the Solvay Mountains between Paprat Peak and Kondolov Peak into the eastern arm of Duperré Bay, in the southern part of Brabant Island in the Palmer Archipelago, Antarctica. The glacier was shown on an Argentine government chart in 1953, but not named. Photographed by Hunting Aerosurveys Ltd in 1956–57, and mapped from these photos in 1959, it was named by the UK Antarctic Place-Names Committee for Edward Jenner, an English physician who was a pioneer of preventive medicine, and who instituted the use of cowpox vaccine in