Hello, brain! The intestines are bothering!
A mechanism for transmitting an alarm signal from the intestine to the brain has been established
Scientists from Australia and the USA have discovered that special enterochromaffin cells of the intestine send information about the state of this organ to the nervous system.
Enterochromaffin cells are isolated with a blue dye on a section of microvilli of the intestinal wall. A snapshot from the UC San Francisco press release Rare Cells are ‘Window Into the Gut’ for the Nervous System - VM.
It is already known that the intestine can exchange signals with the brain. For example, intestinal bacteria affect a person's eating habits, stimulating his desire to eat a particular product. Also, in experiments on mice, it was shown that gut bacteria affect the emotional state, character qualities and social behavior. In a new study, scientists have discovered intestinal cells that send signals to the brain about the presence of potentially dangerous substances in the intestine.
The intestine is the largest human organ, and about 1% of its constituent cells are enterochromaffin cells. It is known that about 90% of all serotonin synthesized in the human body is formed in them. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter through which nerve cells "communicate" with each other, transmitting electrochemical signals. Scientists have suggested that enterochromaffin cells of the intestine synthesize almost all serotonin in the body for a reason and can use it to send some signals to neurons. For their experiment, the researchers took an artificial organoid mini-intestine grown from mouse stem cells.
Observations of enterochromaffin cells in the mini-intestine showed that they actively interacted with neurons. These cells reacted in a specific way to the ingestion of substances of three types into the intestine. These are esters of isobutyric acid, by-products of bacterial activity; hormones-catecholamines (including dopamine, adrenaline and norepinephrine), which can signal stress in the intestine, and the substance allyl isothiocyanate contained in mustard and garlic. In response to the ingestion of these substances into the intestine, enterochromaffin cells released serotonin and transmitted an electrochemical signal to neighboring neurons in the intestine.
As scientists suggest, the reaction of intestinal cells to these substances can serve as a protective mechanism when, in response to foreign substances entering the intestine, the nervous system, having received the appropriate signals, stimulates the intestine to emergency contraction and emptying. But, as scientists say, in addition to their useful function, these cells, being overly activated for some reason, can cause undesirable disorders, such as irritable bowel syndrome. Therefore, this work can help in the search for medicines against these intestinal dysfunctions.
Scientists suggest that from the neurons located in the intestine, information flows directly to the brain.
The study is published in the journal Cell (Bellono et al., Enterochromaffin Cells Are Gut Chemosensors that Couple to Sensory Neural Pathways).
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27.06.2017