Newborn Immune Systems Suppressed | The Scientist Magazine® - 0 views
www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/38187/title/Newborn-Immune-Systems-Suppressed/
newborn immune systems science research
shared by grayton downing on 13 Nov 13
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sterile world of the womb, at birth babies are thrust into an environment full of bacteria, viruses, and parasites. They are very vulnerable to these infections for their first months of life—a trait that has long been blamed on their immature immune systems.
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“This more intricate regulation of immune responses makes more sense than immaturity,” said Sing Sing Way, who led the study, “because it allows a protective response to be mounted if needed.” This may explain why newborn immune responses, though generally weak, also vary wildly between different babies and across different studies.
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njecting 6-day-old mice with splenocytes (a type of white blood cell) from adults. Newborn mice are normally 1,000 times more suspectible to bacterial infections than adults, but despite receiving working immune cells, they became no less vulnerable.
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Baby formulas contain small amounts of arginine. Sidney Morris, a biochemist from the University of Pittsburgh, said that it may be important to avoid fortifying them with extra arginine, lest it swamps the arginase activity of CD71+ cells, releases the immune system, and causes problems for the developing infants’ guts.
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“Whether the precise mechanism of immunosuppression is the same or different in each of these circumstances remains to be determined,” he said.