Special Report on the Future Of Brain Science and Translational Medicine Research Hotspots: Peripheral Organs and The Neural "Dialogue" of the Brain

In recent years, the research on the gut axis is very hot. The gut is also known as the second brain, which is closely connected with the central nervous system.in fact, in addition to the intestinal tract, a large number of studies have shown that there is a close anatomical connection between the kidney, heart, liver, spleen and the central nervous system.under normal circumstances, the important organs of the peripheral nervous system perform different functions, but how to coordinate these processes is poorly understood.on April 29, 2020, the joint team of Tsinghua University and Shanghai University of science and technology published a paper in nature. Through virus tracing technology, it was found that the spleen had neural connections with the amygdala and paraventricular nucleus of the brain, which is the most complete channel regulation pathway of spleen brain communication.with the rapid development of visual virus tracing technology, it greatly promotes the development of the brain's neural circuit, redefines the brain neuroanatomy, making the projection more accurate and the type of neurons more precise.it has become a new method to study the interaction between brain network and peripheral important organs by using neurotrophins to label specific types of cells, which opens the door for the study of visceral brain neuroanatomy.Fig. 1 the projection of virus tracer from heart, lung, intestine to central nervous system has made a series of important progress based on the use of virus tracing technology to reveal the neural projections between multiple peripheral organs and the brain Methods published online the special report of Professor Xiang Hongbing of Tongji Hospital Affiliated to Tongji Medical College of Huazhong University of science and technology as the corresponding author The connection between brain network and peripheral organ function is a hot topic in brain science and translational medicine in the future.respiration is realized by the close cooperation of respiratory system and nervous system.respiratory control neurons are located in the brainstem, and vagus nerve plays a key role in lung brain connectivity.by injecting anterograde tracing virus into the vagal nodal ganglion of p2ry1 CRE, npy2 CRE mice, it was found that the virus was intensively projected to lung tissue and long-distance projected to different brain stem regions.after the anterograde tracing virus was injected into the lung tissue, fluorescence expression was observed in the nucleus tractus solitarius, trigeminal sensory nucleus, pons, thalamus, hypothalamus, insular cortex, cingulate cortex and other brain areas, which indicated that there was anatomical connection between the lung and these brain regions.Fig. 2 the nervous projection of gastrointestinal tract and brain. The gastrointestinal tract is jointly controlled by the central nervous system, intestinal nerve and autonomic nervous system. It is such a complex and orderly regulation that it performs more complex intestinal functions.the vagus nerve is the main sensory nerve of the digestive system (stomach and intestine), sensing intestinal hormones and organ expansion.the information communication between the gut and brain can be carried out directly through two-way neural projection.the anterograde tracing virus was injected into the gastrointestinal wall and showed projections to the vagal complex of medulla oblongata, reticular structure of medulla oblongata and pons, periaqueductal gray matter of midbrain, thalamus and hypothalamus.Professor Xiang Hongbing's team revealed that parafascicular nucleus pathway was involved in gastrointestinal function by injecting retrograde tracing virus into abdominal gastric wall and rectal wall in 2016.Fig. 3 the possible mechanism of acute renal failure caused by deep brain stimulation and spinal cord electrical stimulation. The kidney is an important excretory organ of human body, and its main function is to filter urine and excrete metabolic waste. after the kidney senses the external signals, it is transmitted to the paraventricular nucleus of the inferior colliculus through the renal afferent nerve. The PVN is not only the central nucleus of the renal sympathetic nerve, but also an important integration site of neuroendocrine and autonomic nervous system. normal sympathetic dysfunction of the central nervous system causes renal sympathetic dysfunction, which is considered to be the pathogenic mechanism of renal hypertension. the papers published by Professor Xiang Hongbing in 2011 and 2013 confirmed that fluorescent expression was found in spinal cord, forebrain, midbrain and hindbrain after injection of retrograde tracing virus into kidney. bilateral subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation is an effective method for the treatment of Parkinson's disease motor symptoms, but clinical studies have found that this kind of brain stimulation causes acute renal failure in very few patients. several virus tracing experiments have found that the kidney is retrogradely projected to the pontine tegmental nucleus (PPTg) and the subthalamic nucleus, which indicates that PPTg and subthalamic nucleus can directly project to the kidney, which may be one of the causes of acute renal failure caused by deep brain stimulation. (the source of the pictures in the article is not marked. Neuroweekly apologizes for this!) In general, this paper reviews the neural connections between the heart, kidney, lung, bladder, liver, gastrointestinal and other peripheral organs brain. These anatomical connections provide new research ideas for the physiological functions and diseases of these organs. experts introduce Xiang Hongbing, chief physician, Professor, doctoral / Master Tutor. graduated from the medical department of Tongji Medical University in 1991 and obtained a doctor's degree in anesthesiology from Huazhong University of science and technology in 2004. From 2009 to 2011, he was engaged in basic research on pain, pruritus, and central and peripheral organs and nerve circuits in Yale University and Oregon Health & amp; Science University. presided over four general projects of National Natural Science Foundation of China and a number of science and technology projects of Guangdong Province and Hubei Province. References: use of viruses for intersecting visa specific projects in central nervous system Disclaimer: cover pictures and article pictures are from the Internet, and they are deleted! Nature: the neural mechanism of running faster and farther ● mother's Day Special: the neural mechanism of mother's love for you ● nature reveals the neural circuit of gut brain axis that likes sweet food ● Science: refreshing cognition! Revealing the non classical pathway of visual information into the brain