Research: Why are colds more common in winter?

The age-old mystery of the common cold has long hindered scientists from developing a cure. Have Northeastern researchers found a way to overcome congestion?

A new study highlights the key question of why people are more prone to colds during winter.

The survey results are Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunologysay it could lead to treatments drawn from the body’s own defense mechanisms. Mansur AmijiDistinguished Professor of Pharmacy and Chemical Engineering, Northeastern University.

“Can we eventually create a defense mechanism within the nasal cavity?” says Amiji, who led the study with Dr. Benjamin Breyer, an eye and ear doctor at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts. “Could you create an environment to prevent infection there?”

The number of sick days lost to the common cold reportedly cost the U.S. economy $40 billion annuallyAmazon is among the many groups seeking a cure, 100+ employees For vaccine research and development.

Alternatively, Amiji’s team focused on innate responses, building on a 2018 study to first identify immune mechanisms in the nose and the release of extracellular vesicles, a spray of tiny sacs released from cells. did. Inhalation.

“It’s like kicking a hornet’s nest and all the hornets come out and attack,” Brier says. “The nose detects these pathogens and releases a swarm of extracellular vesicles.”

In their latest study, researchers attempted to answer two questions:

• Does the innate response of the nose also provide protection against viruses? (It turns out that it does.)
• Does air temperature reduce antiviral immune responses? Why does that make people more susceptible to colds, especially in winter?

“There has never been a compelling reason for a very clear increase in viral infectivity in cold weather,” says Briar. “This is the first quantitative and biologically plausible explanation developed.”

Volunteer nose samples were split in Amidi’s northeastern lab and incubated at normal body temperatures of 37 and 32 degrees Celsius.

The researchers found that under normal body temperature conditions, nasal extracellular vesicles are successfully deployed by acting as decoys that directly bind and block viral entry.

“These extracellular vesicles actually bind to the virus, which is suspended in nasal mucus,” says Di Huang, lead author of Eyes and Ears at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts. (Other authors on this paper are Maie Tanami, a former postdoctoral associate, Angela Nocera, a former PhD student in the Amiji Lab, and Alan Workman, a medical fellow at the Massachusetts Eye and Year .)

In tests involving two rhinoviruses and a coronavirus, two typical of the winter flu season, colder temperatures deployed a sparse net of fewer extracellular vesicles.

“This paper reveals a very robust mechanism that explains a lot about how we normally fight off viruses,” says Briar.

Amiji anticipates that the body’s evolved responses to pathogens can be tested against a variety of viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

“So now you have this therapeutic potential,” says Amiji. We now have an antiviral compound that destroys the virus.”

“What’s interesting is that we’re using the natural phenomenon of the nose to limit the transmission of the virus,” adds Amiji, predicting potential consequences.

media contactPlease contact Marirose Sartoretto. [email protected] or 617-373-5718.

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