[A model for exploring afferent signals from the immune system to the nervous system]

Mechanisms of information transmission from the immune system to the nervous system have been studied. The results of the studies support the assumption that these signals can be transmitted by oligopeptides (the products of limited proteolysis) which are the fragments found in the active sites of many regulatory peptides of the nervous and immune systems. The testing of a synthesized tripeptide (Ser-Lys-Asp) has shown that it inhibits the antibody-forming cells in intact mice only in response to the administration of large antigen doses and exerts a protective effect against viral infection. When added to the culture of the incubated leukocytes from the peripheral blood of the oncological patients, the tripeptide lowers an increased or normal functional activity of natural killers. In rabbits, tripeptide administration brings about a complex long-lasting reorganization of bioelectrical activity in subcortical structures of the brain.