A single protein could derail healthy cells and promote inflammation. This is what Danish researchers have discovered while working on the process of chronic inflammation at the origin of inflammatory conditions such as arthritis, which affects the joint and the bones, or psoriasis, a disease of the skin.
Inflammation occurs as a reaction to the presence of a pathogen. The organism then seeks to defend itself in order to neutralize this bacterium or this virus. But when immune cells overreact, it results in chronic inflammation. “By analyzing blood cells, we observed the presence of a particular protein called TL1A which causes healthy cells to behave like those observed in chronic inflammation, explains to Science Daily Dr. Kirsten Reichwald of the Department of Veterinary Disease Biology, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences at the University of Copenhagen. We are not far from unraveling the mystery of inflammation.”
A treatment to block the protein
It was the analysis of blood cells from 50 healthy donors that revealed the essential role of the TL1A protein in the onset of inflammation. The next step for researchers will be to find a biological treatment capable of stopping inflammation by blocking the activity of this protein.
