
Researchers Find Missing Link Between the Brain and Immune System - summerdown2
http://neurosciencenews.com/lymphatic-system-brain-neurobiology-2080/
======
summerdown2
The paper can be found in Nature here:

[http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature14432.html)

~~~
gwern
Fulltext:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/2mmdmty3nxfe5u8/2015-louveau.pdf](https://www.dropbox.com/s/2mmdmty3nxfe5u8/2015-louveau.pdf)
/ [http://sci-hub.org/downloads/e18c/louveau2015.pdf](http://sci-
hub.org/downloads/e18c/louveau2015.pdf)

~~~
atmosx
Thanks!

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anigbrowl
tl;dr lymphatic nodes go all the way up the back of your brain and into your
sinuses. We'd been ripping them out and throwing them away every time we did
autopsies or dissections because they were attached to the inside of the
skull. Oops.

~~~
refurb
_the back of your brain and into your sinuses_

Dural sinuses, not nasal sinuses.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dural_venous_sinuses](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dural_venous_sinuses)

~~~
anigbrowl
Thanks for that. I thought 'up the back of your brain' was clear when I wrote
it but I suppose sinuses are more often associated with a runny nose.

~~~
refurb
I think my comment was more for me than you! I first saw sinuses and thought
"it runs into your nose?".

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fixermark
I'm not a doctor or neuroscientist, but this strikes me as a significant find
if I'm understanding it correctly, right? "We were pretty sure the lymphatic
system doesn't directly connect to the brain. Well we were wrong, (points)
there it is."

~~~
timr
We've known that there had to be a brain/immune connection of some sort. We
didn't know that there was a _tube_.

Remember that most of the interesting stuff in biology is _invisible_ to the
naked eye. Also, despite a few hundred years of poking around in corpses,
we're still pretty crude in terms of what we can see and understand
anatomically. The assumption that we have this stuff "mostly figured out"
strikes me more as wishful thinking than fact.

It's interesting to find a new _tube_ lurking around, but then, it sounds like
a pretty small tube. Animals are messy on the inside. Also, dark.

~~~
shostack
Loved this comment as you did a great job of distilling the level of wonder
that still remains to be discovered.

While I'm not in any way qualified to assess this, it seems the fact that
there's essentially _a new piece of human anatomy_ that we've discovered is
game changing. Potentially on the level of things that cause entire fields of
medicine to re-evaluate what they thought they knew.

I wonder what this means for other things we've taken for granted about
neurochemistry. Any qualified individuals care to speculate on the
possibilities?

~~~
spydum
Very likely I will get downvotes for this but: I suspect we will find there
was far less quackery in some of the eastern medicine practices than we
thought.

~~~
Rangi42
How does the discovery that one culture's beliefs about medicine were less
accurate than expected, make you think that a different culture's beliefs are
_more_ accurate? It's not like eastern and western medicine are binary
opposites, where if one is wrong the other must be right. Especially since
this inaccuracy was only discovered through careful dissection and
observation: what comparable practices did historical eastern medicine use,
that should make it any more accurate than the equivalent old western
superstitions? If "western" medicine has missed this detail up until now, I
highly doubt that "eastern" medicine somehow accounted for it.

~~~
yanowitz
I thought the point was that this provides another channel (etiology?) for
materialist explanations of "Eastern" medicine.

I'm not taking a position on that question, as I haven't studied it
sufficiently (though acupuncture, for example, seems more compelling that
reiki).

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MrBunny
So I have MS. I go to any link that has to do with the Immune system. Recently
I see tons of "discoveries" and attempts to link it to MS. Which gets me
excited but than I start to think how much of this is truth and how much is
bullshit? Or that MS and others like it are so complex that all of the
findings are true... Either way starting to have a hard time finding hope in
any of these articles.

~~~
BadCookie
I risk getting downvoted for this, but have you tried any dietary changes?
There are cases of people with MS who have seen tremendous improvement on a
low histamine or paleo style diet. There are no guarantees, of course, but
what do you have to lose? I would think it would be worth the inconvenience of
trying it out for a few months even if the odds of success are very small.

Here's an example:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLjgBLwH3Wc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLjgBLwH3Wc)

~~~
SwellJoe
_" I risk getting downvoted for this, but have you tried any dietary
changes?"_

Because you should be downvoted for this.

People who have long-standing health conditions, that they have perhaps
battled their whole lives, don't need people on the Internet arm-chair
quarterbacking their treatment. They have medical professionals that they've
worked with for years and trust, they have almost certainly done more research
than you or I about their condition, and they have heard the latest fad cure-
all from everyone, everyday, for years. They get it on their facebook wall,
they get it from well-meaning (but poorly informed) friends and family, and
they get it from strangers on the Internet.

Don't be that stranger on the Internet. Your intentions are positive and
laudable, your actions are not.

In short: Unless someone has _asked_ for advice about treatment options for
their chronic condition, it is probably impolite to offer it.

Source: Conversations with friends with MS, CP, disabilities, autism spectrum
disorders, and various trainings in how to provide safer spaces for people
with a variety of conditions.

~~~
BadCookie
I have a health condition that is just as serious as MS (and is similar to MS
in some ways). None of my doctors (over a 20 year period) ever suggested that
I change my diet, but for me, changing my diet is the closest thing to a
treatment that I will ever see. I WISH that somebody had suggested that I
change my diet, because if I had done it years ago, I might not have
progressed as far as I have. So I'm sorry if the guy I responded to has had
tons of people suggest to him that he should change his diet, but for me, it
was the opposite. No one suggested it. I tried it on my own, out of
desperation and despite my doctors poo-pooing the idea. And it worked. I guess
I got lucky, but there are lots of stories just like mine.

The fact is that doctors are often NOT that helpful for people with
complicated neurological conditions (no one knows this better than I do!), so
some of us are left to fend for ourselves. Given that that's the case, I don't
see what's so terrible about asking someone whether they have tried a
treatment that some people have found to be effective. My perspective is that
an elimination diet is worth a try for anyone with an autoimmune or difficult-
to-diagnose neurological condition. That opinion is based on a lot more
knowledge and personal experience than you have assumed it is, but it's true
that I didn't make that clear in my comment.

The only reason I even responded to MyBunny was that he said that he was
having "a hard time finding hope." I thought that if there was even a sliver
of a chance that my suggestion could help him find hope, then it was worth
getting downvoted to oblivion. But if my voice is merely one of a chorus that
have suggested the same worthless idea to him, then for that I am sorry.

Ultimately, I do see your point, and thank you for your perspective, but I
don't think that I can entirely agree with you.

~~~
SwellJoe
Apologies for making assumptions about where you were coming from. I may have
gotten a bit preachy and reactionary. We're both obviously coming from a place
of wanting to be helpful.

Though I still think the advice to only offer treatment suggestions when asked
is always sound. The Internet seems to exacerbate the problem of overwhelming
amounts of unsolicited advice, which can breed its own sort of despair.

------
nate_meurer
How they discovered it:

> The vessels were detected after Louveau developed a method to mount a
> mouse’s meninges – the membranes covering the brain – on a single slide so
> that they could be examined as a whole. “It was fairly easy, actually,” he
> said. “There was one trick: We fixed the meninges within the skullcap, so
> that the tissue is secured in its physiological condition, and then we
> dissected it."

Can someone explain what it means to fix the meninges to the skullcap? Do they
mean they attached it to the skull bone? How then do they mount a curved bone
to a slide?

~~~
richardbrevig
If I had to venture a guess:

They're referring to fixation [0], or preservation of the tissue, and not to
affixation, the attachment of something.

So, basically, they fixed the tissue _prior_ to removing it from the skull,
causing it to keep form. Whereas, if they removed the tissue from the skull
and then chemically fixed it, the tissue would have already lost form and the
lymph would be undetectable (no longer be in original form).

Think about a cake in a pan. Baking = fixing. Remove the cake before "fixing"
it, and it's a plot of mess. "Fix" it first, and you have a free-standing
cake, it'll hold shape. Bad analogy, sorry. :)

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixation_(histology)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixation_\(histology\))

Edit: forgot reference.

~~~
nate_meurer
Thank you! That makes sense of the wording; they fixed the tissue _within_ the
skullcap, not _to_ it.

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mkagenius
Discoveries like these scares me sometimes that how little we know about our
body and nature.

~~~
iyn
I totally understand the feeling, but on the other hand, it's incredible that
there is so much to explore, so many new things to learn, see and experience.
Yes, everything around seems to be pretty complex, at least considering our
current abilities [0], but I believe that we can choose how we look at the
world/problems - pragmatic optimism may help with feeling overwhelmed :).

[0] Sometimes I think that the perceived complexity of the universe says more
about the mind than the universe itself.

------
BadCookie
Could this finding explain why I (and many other people) get migraine
headaches as part of an allergic response to certain foods?

~~~
msie
Why would anyone downvote you for this?

~~~
msie
I shouldn't be downvoted for questioning why another innocuous comment is
downvoted. I was defending a worthwhile comment. Geez...

~~~
fasteo
Agree; just upvoted you. I guess I will be downvoted now. Recursion at its
best.

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kazinator
Given the previous belief that there are no lymph vessels connecting to the
brain, what was the hypothesis for how lymphoma can spread to the brain?

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pcrh
Awesome finding, I hope it is confirmed soon. Many neurodegenerative diseases
are known to involve an immune component, but how that might occur has been a
mystery.

It has very significant implications for diseases such as Alzheimer's disease,
Lou Gehrig's disease (aka Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, ALS), multiple
sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, etc.

------
pmelendez
> "treatment of neurological diseases ranging from autism to Alzheimer’s"

It upsets me that the author keep referring autism as a disease. A high
functioning autistic would be very offended if you say that their way of
thinking is a disease.

Note to the downvoters: A developmental range of disorders is not a disease.
If you don't agree you are invited to comment.

~~~
proksoup
That is true, offense does come easy.

Ableism and this article comes to mind [http://www.autistichoya.com/p/ableist-
words-and-terms-to-avo...](http://www.autistichoya.com/p/ableist-words-and-
terms-to-avoid.html)

(that their* way of thinking)

~~~
pmelendez
Thanks! I just fixed the typo. The article looks very interesting too.

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austinjp
While is very interesting, from what I can see the research was done in mice
not humans.

The diagram of the "new" human lymphatic system is in the press release not
the research paper.

I do recognise the value of animal models in research, and this is intriguing,
but with tempering with a little caution.

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polskibus
I wonder if this breakthrough will allow development of better atopy
treatments. Allergic rhinitis can be a real pain in the ass.

~~~
foxhedgehog
I've been telling doctors for years that there seems to be some connection
between my digestive issues and my sinus trouble.

------
ENGNR
Connection between autism and immune system potentially found, further study
needed to determine the specifics.

The anti-vaxers are going to have a field day with all this gray area to sow
misinformation into.

~~~
yuhong
I am thinking this may be the reason vaccines appeared to cause autism. Of
course, this is not a reason not to vaccinate, but the point of vaccines is to
invoke the immune system.

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nunodonato
science is catching up with yoga... good to know :P

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sharjeel
Thanks to the HN comments which assured that it is important. Otherwise after
reading the first sentence and processing it with standard sensational
filtering regex of my brain, I wouldn't have proceeded forward.

"In a [stunning|amazing] discovery that overturns [years|decades|centuries] of
[textbook teaching|beliefs|research] [researchers|scientists] at the <XYZ Lab>
have discovered that the <PQR premise> holds false."

~~~
Mahn
Pointless weekend project idea: A service that scans articles for matching
regexes to classify the level of bullshit of what you are reading. It could
even be a browser extension with the bullshit indicator automatically shown
for each page in its icon.

~~~
nkozyra
This just requires some NLP to identify obvious hyperbole. In fact, you could
probably just watch HN for long enough, establish some training data and have
this happen somewhat automatically for you in the browser.

~~~
nitrogen
Basically a spam filter trained on news instead of email. I like it. Could we
get SpamAssassin to do this? (Does it still exist?)

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senorito
Well ... it's great that finally the physiological structures of this
connection are unveiled, but it's been known for a long time that you can
measurably positively affect your immune system by means of meditation which
is a mental process.

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ChristianMarks
Self-promotion is suspect in this highly competitive, and not infrequently
nasty field. It was known that there was some transport mechanism--now there
are details. But I would caution some skepticism, especially when the
discoverer trumpets the extraordinary significance of the discovery.

~~~
ejstronge
>Self-promotion is suspect in this highly competitive, and not infrequently
nasty field.

I'm not sure who's self-promoting; this is a news article about a big
discovery.

> But I would caution some skepticism, especially when the discoverer trumpets
> the extraordinary significance of the discovery.

The linked article is from a news organization.

Further, the data for the article are published in a high-profile journal;
these are fairly credible findings.

~~~
ChristianMarks
If you are not sure, then read the article and keep track of what the
researchers say. This will increase your degree of sureness.

~~~
ChristianMarks
Downvoters can take a warm piss on a power line. The researchers are quoted
asserting the profound significance of their discovery. This is reason to be
skeptical, given the field has a reputation for Nobel prize winners rushing to
publish work they hear about from less well known researchers, and then
claiming the less known researcher stole their ideas from them.

------
aurora72
According to Loren Cordain, autoimmune diseases such as MS are triggered by
eating certain kinds of food such as legume and milk.

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marincounty
I wonder if I will be alive if they ever figure out how the Placebo Effect
works? With discoveries like this--maybe? I always used the Placebo Effect as
the existence of a God. I will probally be proved wrong by science, if God
decides to give me a few years? (Yes, I have faith. I am probably delusional?
It helps me get through the day. I don't want to offend atheists? So, please
don't hammer me.)

~~~
dzhiurgis
I think I see what you mean and was looking for question like this, which is:

Does it mean that brain can control your immune system?

I don't think so. It looks like immune system protects your brain though. Also
I am not medical scientist and it would be nice to hear others opinions.

~~~
lucaspiller
There have been studies on whether being happy makes you healthier, and yes
there is a correlation between it:

[http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/happiness-
stress-h...](http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/happiness-stress-heart-
disease/)

Whether that's due to this, or just the fact that the brain controls the
release of stress hormones into the bloodstream is a different question.

~~~
dzhiurgis
I think what you also find is that people who keep healthy lifestyle are
happier. I think the correlation and causation is flipped on this one.

