Scientists from the Luxembourg Centre for Systems
Biomedicine (LCSB) of the University of Luxembourg have discovered that immune
cells in the brain can produce a substance that prevents bacterial growth:
namely itaconic acid.
Until now, biologists had assumed that only certain fungi
produced itaconic acid. A team working with Dr. Karsten Hiller, head of the
Metabolomics Group at LCSB and funded by the ATTRACT program of Luxembourg's
National Research Fund, and Dr. Alessandro Michelucci has now shown that even
so-called microglial cells in mammals are also capable of producing this acid.
“This is a ground breaking result,” says Prof. Dr. Rudi Balling, director of
LCSB: “It is the first proof of an endogenous antibiotic in the brain.” The
researchers have now published their results in the prestigious scientific
journal PNAS.