Can stimulating the "acupoints" of the legs cure diseases?

Sepsis induced by bacterial infection (sepsis) is a severe systemic inflammatory reaction that is fatal

In a paper published today in the top academic journal Nature, a research team led by Harvard University neurobiology professor Ma Qiufu demonstrated an experimental method of stimulating "acupoints" to treat sepsis: Researchers are suffering from sepsis.

In response to this research, "Nature" published a review article at the same time.

It is easy for people to think of traditional acupuncture

The researchers pointed out that if electro-acupuncture is to be developed as a reliable, effective and sensitive treatment method, it is a very critical step to clarify the neuron network behind the "acupoints" stimulated by electro-acupuncture

Since 2017, Professor Ma Qiufu's research team has been committed to discovering the mechanism by which electroacupuncture activates neural pathways and regulates inflammation

Specifically, the researchers found that electrical stimulation of the "Zusanli" position activates a group of sensory neurons that express the Prokr2 protein

Interestingly, neurons expressing Prokr2 are stimulated at different intensities, which activates different neural pathways

▲Moderate stimulation of "Zusanli" (ST36) in mice causes the neural network of the systemic anti-inflammatory response: activates Prokr2 sensory neurons and drives the vagus nerve-adrenal axis (picture source: reference [2])

The nerve fibers of this type of Prokr neuron have a specific distribution area, which explains the need for stimulation at specific "acupoints" in anti-inflammatory electroacupuncture

In order to verify the role of Prokr2 neurons, researchers optogenetics and other experimental methods artificially activated Prokr2 expressing neurons, and found that they can simulate the anti-inflammatory effect of electroacupuncture; on the contrary, if this group of neurons is specifically destroyed, it will Let electric acupuncture fail to suppress systemic inflammation

The review article in the journal Nature concluded that these results provide for the first time a molecular marker, targeting neurons with this molecular marker to design specific stimulation methods that can be used to remotely regulate body functions

Note: The original text has been deleted

Reference materials:

[1] Shenbin Liu et al.

[2] Neurons that switch off inflammation.