Some of the molecules That they activate in the body In case of illness They have a surprising ‘side’ effect: act also at the level of the brain by modifying behaviorin particular doing increase anxiety and sociability. Two related studies led by Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard medicine school, published in the Cell magazine, have discovered this, which show that brain and immune system they are much more interconnected of what was thought. The results also open to innovative treatments for disorders such as Autism and depressionwhich could exploit this unexpected connection by acting indirectly through the immune system.
Already several years ago, some studies conducted on autistic children they observed that theirs Symptoms decrease temporarily When they have a feverwhile clinical experiments for drugs that act on immune cells they showed negative effects unexpected on the mental health of the participants. To shed light on the matter, the researchers coordinated by Gloria Choi del Mit and Jun Huh by Harvard have focused on a molecule called Interleuchina-17 (IL-17)which performs a Important role in defense of the body against the infections helping to control inflammation.
The authors of the studies have discovered that there are receptors for these molecules in two different brain regions, where they exert two effects that seem opposite: In the amygdala, the IL-17 causes anxietyWhile in the somatosensory cortex promote behavior more sociable. According to the researchers, this strange mechanism could be explained if the IL-17 had originally evolved as neuromodistand that only later was ‘enrolled’ by the immune system. A hypothesis supported by the fact that, in the Verme Caenorhabditis Elegans, this molecule does not play any immune role, but is active only at the level of neurons.
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