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Fighting food allergy
For people with food allergies, a slice of pizza or a peanut butter sandwich can be deadly. Yet despite the increasing prevalence of food allergy, little is known as to the immunological causes. Now, Zhang et al. report that infants who later developed food allergy had altered immunity at birth. Cord blood from these infants had more monocytes compared with CD4+ T cells and decreased numbers of regulatory T cells. Moreover, the monocytes from food-allergic infants secreted more inflammatory cytokines than those from healthy infants. These cytokines suppressed interleukin-2 (IL-2) expression by CD4+ T cells and skewed differentiation of these cells to a nonclassical T helper 2 (TH2) phenotype. Anti-inflammatory strategies should therefore be considered in preventing food allergy in these individuals.
- Copyright © 2016, American Association for the Advancement of Science
