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Molecules that fight infection also act on the brain

MIT scientists find the protein IL-17 that fights infection also acts on the brain, inducing anxiety or sociability. This adds to evidence that immune molecules can influence behavior during illness.

These findings suggest that the immune and nervous systems are tightly interconnected, says Gloria Choi, an associate professor of brain and cognitive sciences, a member of MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory, and one of the senior authors of the studies. This finding may help to explain unexpected outcomes observed in a clinical trial of a drug targeting the IL-17-RA receptor for psoriasis treatment, particularly regarding its potential adverse effects on mental health. “We hypothesize that there’s a possibility that the IL-17 ligand that is upregulated in this patient cohort might act on the brain to induce suicide ideation, while in animals there is an anxiogenic phenotype,” Choi says.

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