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	Podcast:		UC Science Today
	Episode:		The origins of asthma and allergies may come down to one molecule
	Category:		Science & Medicine
	Duration:		00:01:03
	Publish Date:		2017-01-11 18:00:00
	Description:		Researchers may have narrowed down the origins of asthma and allergies to just one molecule. Susan Lynch, a gastroenterologist at the University of California, San Francisco and her colleagues at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit have found a metabolite - a product of metabolism - that can trigger the diseases. "There was a specific Lipid called 12, 13-diHome. This specific lipid is an established biomarker for asthma in adults, and we are finding it in the heightened concentration in neonates who go on to develop asthma in childhood". The researchers have also discovered how this molecule affects babies' immune systems. "That specific lipid actually suppresses the critical cell type, the T- regulatory cells that are necessary to dampen allergic inflammation". Lynch explains that the weakening of these cells is one of the most critical immune dysfunctions that underlie allergies.
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