Topic summary
Effector T cells
Extracted from the Wikipedia article T helper cell.
Limitations to the Th1/Th2 model
One major difference between regulatory T cells and effector T cells is that regulatory T cells typically serve to modulate and deactivate the immune response, while effector T cell groups usually begin with immune-promoting cytokines and then switch to inhibitory cytokines later in their life cycle. The latter is a feature of Th3 cells, which transform into a regulatory subset after its initial activation and cytokine production.