The nematode worm C. elegans consumes familiar bacterial species more rapidly than it does novel ones, and this preference for familiarity is mediated by a pair of serotonergic neurons.
Experiments in mice have shown than an enzyme that repairs broken DNA inside the nucleus also has a central role in the innate immune system because it is able to detect foreign DNA outside the nucleus.
BJ Ferguson, DS Mansur, NE Peters, H Ren, GL Smith
A protein that can recognize regions of DNA with a high proportion of unmethylated CpG dinucleotides, and then recruit polycomb group proteins to these CpG islands, has been identified.
AM Farcas, NP Blackledge, I Sudbery, HK Long, JF McGouran, NR Rose, S Lee, D Sims, A Cerase, TW Sheahan, H Koseki, N Brockdorff, CP Ponting, BM Kessler, RJ Klose