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Brain borders at the central stage of neuroimmunology

Nature volume 612, pages 417–429 (2022)Cite this article

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Abstract

The concept of immune privilege suggests that the central nervous system is isolated from the immune system. However, recent studies have highlighted the borders of the central nervous system as central sites of neuro-immune interactions. Although the nervous and immune systems both function to maintain homeostasis, under rare circumstances, they can develop pathological interactions that lead to neurological or psychiatric diseases. Here we discuss recent findings that dissect the key anatomical, cellular and molecular mechanisms that enable neuro-immune responses at the borders of the brain and spinal cord and the implications of these interactions for diseases of the central nervous system.

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Fig. 1: Neuro-immune crosstalk.
Fig. 2: Anatomical sites for neuro-immune interactions at the brain borders.
Fig. 3: Meninges and neuro-immune interactions.
Fig. 4: Skull bone marrow and neuro-immune interactions.

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Acknowledgements

This work was conducted with funding from the Royal Society of New Zealand Rutherford Discovery Fellowship (J.R.) and National Institutes of Health grant AT010416 (J.K.), National Institutes of Health grant AG034113 (J.K.), and National Institutes of Health grant AG057496 (J.K.). We thank M. S. Barski and Reciprocal Space for the initial figure preparation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Brain immunology and Glia (BIG), Washington University in St Louis, School of Medicine, St Louis, MO, USA

    Justin Rustenhoven & Jonathan Kipnis

  2. Department of Pathology and Immunology, Washington University in St Louis, School of Medicine, St Louis, MO, USA

    Justin Rustenhoven & Jonathan Kipnis

  3. Department of Pharmacology and Clinical Pharmacology, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

    Justin Rustenhoven

  4. Center for Brain Research, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

    Justin Rustenhoven

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  1. Justin Rustenhoven
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J.R. and J.K. discussed the content of the manuscript including the selection of key studies, wrote and edited the manuscript, and generated figure outlines.

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Correspondence to Justin Rustenhoven or Jonathan Kipnis.

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J.K. is a member of a scientific advisory group for PureTech and holds patents and patent applications related to the findings discussed in this Review.

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Rustenhoven, J., Kipnis, J. Brain borders at the central stage of neuroimmunology. Nature 612, 417–429 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05474-7

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