Principles of early T-cell activation

Simon's laboratory strives to obtain insights into immune function by trying first to understand how the relevant molecules behave. Simon’s research has taken this approach because it constrains the possibilities for thinking about what the molecules might actually be doing. His work therefore relies for the most part on structure- and single-molecule imaging-based approaches. Simon has explored the mechanism of weak, specific recognition at cell surfaces, established the molecular composition of the T-cell surface and, with Anton van der Merwe, proposed a counter-intuitive explanation for how the T-cell receptor initiates immune responses, called the kinetic-segregation model.