THE IMMUNE SYSTEM DEFENSE LAB
Natural barriers include the skin, mucous membranes, tears, earwax, mucus, and stomach acid. Also, the normal flow of urine washes out microorganisms that enter the urinary tract. The immune system uses white blood cells and antibodies to identify and eliminate organisms that get through the body's natural barriers. Innate, or nonspecific, immunity is the defense system with which you were born. It protects you against all antigens. Innate immunity involves barriers that keep harmful materials from entering your body. These barriers form the first line of defense in the immune response.
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Immune-Modulating Perspectives for Low Frequency Electromagnetic Fields in Innate Immunity
In recent years, the effects of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) on the immune system have received a considerable interest, not only to investigate possible negative health impact but also to explore the possibility to favorably modulate immune responses. To generate beneficial responses, the immune system should eradicate pathogens while “respecting” the organism and tolerating irrelevant antigens. According to the current view, damage-associated molecules released by infected or injured cells, or secreted by innate immune cells generate danger signals activating an immune response. These signals are also relevant to the subsequent activation of homeostatic mechanisms that control the immune response in pro- or anti-inflammatory reactions, a feature that allows modulation by therapeutic treatments. In the present review, we describe and discuss the effects of extremely low frequency (ELF)-EMF and pulsed EMF on cell signals and factors relevant to the activation of danger signals and innate immunity cells. By discussing the EMF modulating effects on cell functions, we envisage the use of EMF as a therapeutic agent to regulate immune responses associated with wound healing.
Whole Body Vibration Triggers a Change in the Mutual Shaping State of Intestinal Microbiota and Body's Immunity
Whole body vibration (WBV) is a non-invasive physical therapy that has recently been included in the hospital’s patient rehabilitation training catalog, but its health effects have not been sufficiently studied. In the present study, to examine thepossible effects of WBV on immune cell differentiation, the IFN, IL-4,−17, F4/80 andCD3,−4,−8,−11b,−11c,−19 markers were used to characterizing the cells in spleen. The results showed that the CD4 and CD25 positive lymphocytes in the spleen were significantly increased in the WBV group, and the population of Treg cells was enhanced significantly in response to WBV. Since the differentiation in immune cells is usually associated with microbiota, therefore the intestinal flora was characterized in human individuals. The results indicated that WBV significantly reduced theα-diversity of intestinal microbiota. Moreover, the principal coordinate analysis(PCoA) results indicated that theβ-diversities of both mice and human fecal microbiota increased after WBV. Analysis of the bacterial composition indicated that the contents of a variety of bacteria changed upon the stimulation of vibration, such as Lactobacillus animalis, and Lactobacillus paraplantarum and Lactobacilluss anfranciscensis in human. The succeeding correlation analysis revealed that some bacteria with significant content variations were correlated to the regulatory T cell differentiation and physical characteristics in human.
Repeated Low-Temperature Sauna Therapy Improves Cardiac and Exercise Capacity as well as Immune Competence in Patients with Heart Failure
Backgrounds: Immune dysfunction has been postulated to play a role in the pathophysiology of chronic heart failure (CHF). The decreased number of lymphocytes correlates with an adverse prognosis and natural killer (NK) cell function is impaired in CHF patients. Repeated sauna therapy, namely Waon therapy (WT), improves cardiac and endothelial function in CHF patients. We investigated whether WT could improve the immune competence and mental quality of life (QOL) in CHF patients, in addition to improving cardiac and exercise capacity.
Methods: Sixty CHF patients (68±15yo) were treated with 60°C far infrared-ray dry sauna bath for 15 minutes and then kept in a bed covered with blankets for 30 minutes once a day for 3 weeks. At baseline and 3 weeks after WT, cardiac function, 6-minute walk distance (6MWD), flow mediated dilation (FMD) of the brachial artery, the number of circulating endothelial progenitor cells (EPC), physical and mental QOL scores assessed by SF36, NK cell activity, and the number of lymphocytes of peripheral blood were determined.
Results: All indices of LVEF (35±14 to 38±15%, p<0.01), BNP (487±466 to 375±384pg/ml, p<0.01), 6MWD (319±124 to 368±130m, p<0.01) and FMD (4.0±2.9 to 5.2±2.7%, p<0.01) were improved by WT, whereas EPC tended to increase (1.08±0.95 to 1.25±1.23/μ l, p=0.10). WT significantly improved both physical QOL scores of SF-36 and its mental scores such as general health, vitality, and mental health. NK cell activity increased (21.2±12.5 to 24.1±17.7%, p<0.05), and the number of lymphocytes tended to increase after WT (1689±596 to 1776±770/μ l, p=0.10). In non-ischemic CHF patients (n=33), however, WT significantly increased the number of lymphocytes (1673±576 to 1849±870/μ l, p<0.05), in association with greater improvement of SF36 scores and LVEF, compared to CHF patients with ischemic heart disease.
Conclusion: WT might ameliorate mental QOL and immune competence, in addition to improving cardiac and exercise capacity in patients with CHF, especially in non-ischemic CHF patients.