Why does the flu make you feel so crummy? Neurons in throat may be to blame

When you come down with the flu, your body lets you know. You lose your appetite, you feel sluggish, and your mood takes a hit. The infection itself doesn’t cause these symptoms—your brain does. Now, scientists may have figured out a key part of how this happens. Studying mice with influenza, they found a cluster of nerve cells in the back of the throat that detects a virus’ presence and sends signals to the brain, triggering symptoms that respond to the infection. The study is among the first to pin this response on a specific population of nerve cells, says Anoj Ilanges, a biologist at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus who was not involved in the work. “They’ve done a really great job of looking at this comprehensively.” Scientists know feeling crummy during an illness is partly the result of chemicals produced by infected tissue . Several of these compounds, such as prostaglandins, are known to trigger sickness behaviors. (Drugs such as ibuprofen work by blocking prostaglandin production.) But it’s often unclear exactly how these chemicals communicate with the brain, says Stephen Liberles, a molecular neuroscientist at Harvard Medical School. “Surprisingly little is understood about how the brain becomes aware that there’s an infection in the body.” In the new study, Liberles, postdoc Na-Ryum Bin, and colleagues focused on influenza, which infects the body’s airways. Previous resear...
Source: Science of Aging Knowledge Environment - Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research