Inflammation caused by trauma and invasion of pathogens has been considered to be less thankful, but a surprising relationship between inflammation and tissue regeneration has become clear.A research group led by Associate Professor Atsushi Kawakami of the School of Life Science and Technology, Tokyo Institute of Technology, revealed that the right level of inflammation is important for tissue regeneration by analysis using zebrafish (small tropical fish).
Multicellular organisms can survive longer by regenerating damaged tissues and cells.Even in vertebrates, teleost fish have a very high tissue regeneration ability, and even if they lose organs such as limbs and fins, they can completely regenerate the same ones.In a previous study, Associate Professor Kawakami and colleagues discovered that zebrafish mutants lacking immune cells such as macrophages (a type of white blood cell) cause cell death and cannot regenerate tissues.
This time, when the mechanism of inducing cell death was investigated, it was found that the cause was the excessive action and inflammation of interleukin 1β (a type of bioactive protein called a cytokine) in regenerated tissues.On the other hand, the action and inflammation of interleukin 1β were not only bad for regeneration.It was also shown that inflammation itself has an essential role in tissue regeneration, as tissue regeneration does not occur normally even when the inflammatory response is eliminated.
This study revealed that controlling interleukin 1β-mediated inflammation to moderate levels is important in tissue regeneration.In the future, it is expected that the ability to regenerate tissues in humans will be improved by investigating the inflammatory response in non-renewable tissues such as mammals and elucidating anti-inflammatory factors produced by macrophages.
