Recent Research Found Brain Contains Lymphatic Vessels

摘要

The mammalian brain, long thought to lack a lymphatic system, contains canonical lymphatic vessels that bear the molecular markers of the structures that carry fluid and immune cells from the tissues to the lymph nodes elsewhere in the body, according to a mouse study published in the June 1 2015 issue of Nature. See for details: A. Louveau et al., "Structural and functional features of central nervous system lymphatic vessels," Nature, doi:10.1038/ naturel4432, 2015. The relationship between the brain and the immune system has long puzzled researchers. For some time, scientists thought that immune cells only showed up in the brain during an infection. The brain is considered "immune privileged," such that when exposed to foreign material, it takes longer to mount an immune response than does the rest of the body. Furthermore, to date, traditional lymphatic vessels had not been found there.