Brain and central nervous system
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Researchers have discovered tiny vessels connecting the brain to the immune system – which could profoundly alter the treatment of autism, Alzheimer’s disease, and multiple sclerosis.

The team at the University of Virginia School of Medicine found the brain – like every other tissue – is connected to the immune system through lymphatic vessels, although these had never been detected despite a thorough mapping of the body.

“I really did not believe there are structures in the body that we are not aware of. I thought the body was mapped,” said Jonathan Kipnis, a neuroscience professor and director of the university’s Center for Brain Immunology and Glia. “I thought that these discoveries ended somewhere around the middle of the last century — but apparently they have not.”

The vessels are “well hidden” along a major blood vessel that travels down into the sinuses, the researchers said, and were discovered only after devising a new way to examine the membrane covering the […]