Your Brain Parasite Isn’t Making You Sick. Here’s Why.

The UVA researchers found that the parasite, Toxoplasma gondii, is kept in check by brain defenders called microglia. These microglia release a unique immune molecule, IL-1a, that recruits immune cells from the blood to control the parasite in the brain, the scientists discovered. This process works so well that very few people develop symptomatic toxoplasmosis, the disease the parasite causes. 

Understanding the role of microglia is essential because they are normally the only immune cells inside the brain. The new finding reveals how they recruit help when needed, and that discovery could apply to any brain condition with an immunological component – including brain injury, Alzheimer’s disease, stroke, multiple sclerosis and more. 

“Microglia must die to save the brain from this infection,” said researcher Tajie Harris of UVA’s Department of Neuroscience and the interim director of the Center for Brain Immunology and Glia, or BIG. “Otherwise the IL-1a remains stuck inside the microglia and wouldn’t alert the immune system that something is wrong.”

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Q&A: Dr. William Petri on COVID-19, Vaccines and the Pandemic

Dr. William Petri, a chaired professor of infectious diseases and international health at UVA and vice chair for research in the Department of Medicine, is studying the effects of the disease on the immune system, and seeking new treatments and vaccines.

Here he discusses COVID-19 for readers of UVA Today.

Q. What is the most striking thing you’ve learned about this disease?

A. The most striking thing is the extreme degree to which the immune system is activated in patients with severe COVID-19. In our lab we study many infectious diseases, including highly inflammatory ones, and they all pale compared to the immune activation with COVID-19 that Mary Young, a researcher in our lab, has observed. We’re testing a hypothesis that the immune system is actually making things worse when responding to this coronavirus.

We’ve learned through our work with researcher Allie Donlan in the Carter Immunology Center that a signaling molecule called Interleukin 13 – which can contribute to lung damage – is much more frequently elevated in people requiring mechanical ventilation than in people whose infection is less severe. In the mouse model of SARS-CoV-2 infection that infectious diseases professor Barb Mann has developed, neutralization of IL-13 is protective from COVID-19. Fortunately, therapies for turning off this part of the immune system already exist, and are approved for treating allergic lung disease. So, it could be a short path to a clinical trial specifically for treating the inflammation of COVID-19 by inhibiting or neutralizing Interleukin 13. We are continuing to explore this in our own lab.

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In Victory Against Polio, Hope for the Battle Against COVID-19

For much of the 20th century, summer was “polio season,” and people were accustomed to seeing swimming pools and movie theaters closed to stave off the latest epidemic. Shaking hands was off limits, and even touching money was thought perilous. The ever-present threat of death or permanent paralysis from polio was part of life, as were regular social-distancing efforts to limit the terrible disease’s spread.

For many younger people in America, the idea of living under threat from a such a serious infectious disease has been hard to imagine, at least until COVID-19. But now the story of the victory over polio is even more resonant. In a new editorial in the journal Science, UVA Health’s Dr. William A. Petri and graduate student Alexandra N. Donlan highlight medicine’s great triumph over polio, at least in the West, and hold out hope we can do the same for COVID-19.https://news.virginia.edu/subscribe-form

“Nearly seven decades ago the United States was faced with a similar challenge: the race to develop a vaccine against an infectious disease,” said Petri, an infectious disease expert who is developing a COVID vaccine. “Jonas Salk’s demonstration of the ability of vaccination to prevent paralysis due to polio in 1955 led to a nationwide celebration and Salk’s invitation to the White House.”

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COVID-19: UVA Discovery Spurs Clinical Trial of Antidepressant to Fight Virus

An antidepressant medication is being tested as a potential treatment for COVID-19 after University of Virginia School of Medicine researchers determined it may prevent dangerous overreactions by the immune system.

Researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis are launching a clinical trial to determine if the drug fluvoxamine can prevent “cytokine storms,” in which the body is flooded with immune cells called cytokines. This frenzied immune response can lead to life-threatening organ failure and has been a major concern in patients with severe COVID-19 infections.

UVA researchers Alban Gaultier and Dorian A. Rosen found last year that fluvoxamine may stop the deadly inflammation known as sepsis, in which the immune response spirals out of control. The drug, they determined, reduced the production of cytokines. It proved effective in mice as a preventative treatment for sepsis, and now it will be tested as a protective measure for patients with COVID-19. 

Click here to read the full article at https://news.virginia.edu.