- NEW DELHI — A
team of researchers has discovered how daylight can boost the immune system’s
ability to fight infections.
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- The finding paves the way for development of drugs that
target the circadian clock in neutrophils to boost their ability to fight
infections, said the study led by scientists at Waipapa Taumata Rau, University
of Auckland.
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- The team focused on the most abundant immune cells in our
bodies, called ‘neutrophils’, which are a type of white blood cell. These cells
move quickly to the site of an infection and kill invading bacteria.
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- The researchers used zebrafish, a small freshwater fish, as
a model organism, because its genetic make-up is similar to ours and they can
be bred to have transparent bodies, making it easy to observe biological
processes in real time.
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- “In earlier studies, we had observed that immune responses
peaked in the morning, during the fish’s early active phase,” says Associate
Professor Christopher Hall, from the Department of Molecular Medicine and
Pathology.
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- “We think this represents an evolutionary response such that
during daylight hours the host is more active so more likely to encounter
bacterial infections,” Hall added.
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- However, the scientists wanted to find out how the immune
response was being synchronised with daylight.
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- With this new study, published in Science Immunology,
neutrophils were found to possess a circadian clock that alerted them to
daytime, and boosted their ability to kill bacteria.
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- Most of our cells have circadian clocks to tell them what
time of day it is in the outside world, in order to regulate the body’s
activities. Light has the biggest influence on resetting these circadian
clocks.
