Researchers have found new evidence to explain the emergence of food problems in normal people over time.
Fifteen million Americans, including children, have food allergies. Symptoms of allergies can range from superficial itchy skin to suspected anaphylaxis (a severe allergic attack) that can kill.
Many people lose their sensitivity as they reach puberty. This is because their immune systems are learning how to tolerate food that they once considered unhealthy.
Researchers at the Layola Institute sought to explain why children are more prone to food allergies than adults, despite eating more limited types of food.
Their hypothesis is the effect of a normal diet on intestinal cells; In such a way that they prevent food from being rejected by the immune system.
Both food and pathogens show both super-molecular markers called antigens. These antigens tell the immune system that food is inappropriate.
Lymphocyte T disrupts immune response
Previous studies in mice have examined how the body recognizes enemy-friendly antigens.
Mice were fed egg protein that they had not eaten before. The production of an immunosuppressive cell in the gut, called regulatory lymphocyte T, was then observed. This cell protected the new material against the immune system’s response.
But we did not know that this could actually happen to young mammals if they ate new food.
The researchers used mice that did not have antigens to provide a model that lacked any immunity. Mice grew in a mass-free environment and were also fed amino acids, the main constituents of protein, instead of protein-rich foods.
This weakened the mice in terms of immunity, because the amino acids were not large enough for the immune system to recognize them. This means that the mice had no background, or at least a slight background, of protein antigens and other supermolecules.
The other mice were fed a normal diet.
Examination of molecular markers showed that amino acid-fed mice showed no sign of regulatory T lymphocytes in their small intestine. Conversely, innumerable T-regulatory lymphocytes were seen in the small intestine of mice fed a normal diet.
Therefore, it can be assumed that the protein in the food leads to the growth of regulatory lymphocytes. It also states that regulatory lymphocytes in the intestines of normal mice can be used to prevent the immune system from damaging the proteins.
The researchers added that beneficial foods and bacteria in the gut produce different types of regulatory T lymphocytes.
Mass-free mice appear to have only food-based “lymphocyte T-regulators” and are devoid of lymphocyte-T regulators induced by healthy microbes. Also, these mice showed a high ability to accept allergies.
The scientists concluded that the gut needed both food-based and microbial regulatory T lymphocytes.
What happens if the immune system attacks the harmful antigens?
Finally, the researchers wanted to know what could be done to prevent the immune system from leaving out the harmful antigens in the attack.
To do this, they injected informant T lymphocytes into the bodies of massless mice and then fed them protein they had not eaten before. Informant T lymphocytes were designed to show immune system responses.
Mice given the protein had a stronger immune response than mice on a normal diet, and the researchers called this strong reaction the “default response,” which was similar to an immune system attacking harmful microbes.
The results showed that this reaction occurred due to the lack of density of regulatory lymphocytes T ready to suppress the immune system and reduce the body’s inflammatory response to food.
This may be why children, who have eaten fewer types of food, are more prone to food allergies . Research also points to a loss of food sensitivity as the range of regulatory T lymphocytes expands, making it safe to read new foods.
The next step is to examine the cellular and molecular details of how to modulate the strong default response of T lymphocytes. And the research team plans to focus on common allergies, such as peanuts, eggs and the like.
The researchers added:
The immune system is designed to protect us from things that are not our own, such as viruses or other pathogens, but we still use nutrients that are foreign to the immune system. The results of our work show that food tolerance in our body requires a certain amount of T lymphocytes that are produced by continuing to consume the same food. Without these lymphocytes, the body’s immune system would react strongly to the molecules in the food.