The immune system is a complex network of
specialized organs, glands and cells which when working properly protect the body from
pathogens such as virus, bacteria, fungus and foreign tissue such as cancer. This system
is composed of two basic sub-systems, the Humoral and the Cellular or Cell
Mediated. These two sub-systems have different methods of defending the body from disease.
The Humoral side uses chemical warfare (antibodies) to defeat invading pathogens. Cell
Mediated Immunity employs shock troops (T-cells) to attack and kill invaders. This is the
body’s mechanism for immune response to specific virus and cancer.
B-lymphocytes (B-cells) and T-lymphocytes (T-cells) are sub populations of white blood
cells and are the soldiers used by the immune system. B-cells are the antibody producers
used in Humoral Immunity, and T-cells are the shock troops used in Cell Mediated Immunity.
They are all born in the bone marrow, but they mature differently. B-cells mature in the
bone marrow, hence the B for bone marrow. T-cells are matured by proteins produced by the
thymus gland, hence the T for thymus.
Both sides of the Immune System must function properly in order for the body to have an
optimum Immune Response to invading pathogens. In fact, B-cells will react quicker,
proliferate, expand clonally and produce an antibody response more efficiently in the
presence of a T-cell response. So it could be said that T-cells divide B-cells to an
extent.
Central to beginning the immune response is activation of the T-4 lymphocyte (helper
cell). Activation takes place when the T-4 cell recognizes the antigen displayed by an
invading pathogen. Once activated the T-4 cell produces Interleukin and Interferon
proteins also called lymphokines or cytokines, but more simply defined as immune proteins.
These immune proteins in turn activate or program T-8 lymphocytes (killer cells). When the
killer cell is programmed, it is programmed to find and kill the specific antigen
producing pathogen. Additionally, the activated T-4 cell causes B-cells to produce
antibodies more efficiently.
However, before the T-4 cell can recognize the antigen, and begin this cascade of events,
which keep us healthy, it must first receive its programming from the thymus gland.
The thymus gland is a ductless gland located just beneath the breast
bone. It produces proteins or factors, which program T-lymphocytes. This organ has long
been known, but its critical function in the immune system was only discovered about 30
years ago. It is only the past 20 years with advances in cellular biology and development
of genetic engineering that the vital importance of thymus proteins is beginning to be
understood.
Over the past few years, scientists have discovered properties of
specific thymic proteins. The research has been conducted over decades by scientists
studying cancer, and has accelerated in recent years with the growth in the number of
people with AIDS. This area of study is important to AIDS research because the HIV virus
infects T-cells, specifically the T-4 cell.
A number of factors affect normal thymic function. The most common factor is age. Just
through the aging process, normal thymus function diminishes beginning at birth, and
normally by age 40 to 45, a person has little or no active thymus protein production left.
Other known factors which will accelerate thymus atrophy are exposure to radiation,
chemicals, chronic disease or trauma. Perhaps most importantly, common viral infections
such as Chicken Pox, Measles or Epstein-Barr virus which otherwise may have little or no
clinical manifestation may in fact impair thymic activity to such an extent as to make a
person more likely to develop cancer.
HIV also affects the thymus gland. Production of thymic protein is
drastically reduced within weeks of an HIV infection thereby inhibiting the T-4 cells from
starting the immune response. Untreated, HIV infection will result in suppression of
immune response to even the most common pathogen. Immune suppression can be recognized by
other manifestations as well.
IMMUNE DYSFUNCTION and
SUPPRESSION
There are some sixty-five million Americans who suffer from a
dysfunctioning immune system. Among the manifestations of this disorder are a
variety of diseases:
- Autoimmune
disease such as arthritis, asthma, allergy, lupus, diabetes, and
chronic respiratory problems are caused by immune dysfunction.
- Chronic viral infection, chronic fatigue, Epstein-Barr virus, AIDS, and cancer may also
result from immune suppression.
The Immune System is so complex in its relationships to organs, glands
and cells, immune dysfunction and suppression can have a number of different causes. The
thymus gland plays such a pivotal and important role in generating and regulating immune
response, a deficiency of the thymus by aging, disease, radiation, chemicals, chronic
disease, or trauma, etc., will cause immune dysfunction and /or suppression to occur.
Physicians have always treated deficiencies involving the thyroid gland, the pancreas,
adrenal gland, etc. with physiologic replacements. Indeed the theory has been, "If a
gland dries up, replace it". So, why not replace thymus proteins when the thymus
gland dries up?
A CASE FOR REPLACEMENTS
Extracts of thymus generally consist of whole thymus gland, which is
ground and dried or strained into liquid and administered in capsules or in sublingual
drops.
By the very nature of how these extracts are processed, the resultant Product is a
conglomeration of thymus tissue, cell debris, fragments of thymus proteins and
thymus by products.
These extracts have been available for years and have shown some small level of
effectiveness in treating various immune deficiencies and some specific medical
conditions. In fact, one such fragmented thymus protein, Thymosin has been approved as an
adjuvant treatment for Hepatitis B in China.
Extracts contain fragmented thymic peptides. They are only slightly effective because they
are fragments. To attain full effectiveness, a protein must have specific shape, which has
exact transmitter and receptor sites. Only a whole protein molecule would be expected to
have full biological activity.
It is therefore logical that since supplying whole thymus in a processed and fragmented
form helps people with thymus deficiencies, it would be much more effective to supply a
purified whole thymus protein which is biologically active.
PURIFIED THYMUS PROTEIN
An immunologist has patented a technology whereby he can grow thymus
cells in a laboratory and from the product of the cell's metabolism, purify a specific
thymus protein. It has been proven in laboratory and animal experiments that this specific
thymus protein is the protein which causes the T-4 lymphocyte to mature, thereby
initiating a specific cell mediated immune response.
This specific protein has been assayed chemically and in animal models for the production
of Interleukin 2. Interleukin 2 production by T-4 cells is the benchmark measurement for
T-cell maturity and initiation of immune response. The protein is routinely tested in a
rat model for the suppression of flu virus, which further demonstrates the initiation of
the cascade of events which results in immune response to specific pathogen (Cell Mediated
Immune Response).
A trial with 22 cats infected with Feline Immunodefficiency Virus (FIV) concluded that
this protein enhances immune response as measured by clinical and laboratory parameters.
Immune response is demonstrated by response to infectious agents measured in the blood,
diminished disease symptoms, survival, and lymphocyte values.
An experiment published in The Journal of Immunology and
Immunopathology in 1984 proved that this protein is conserved among species. The
experiment was to transplant human thymus cells, which produce this protein, into renal
capsule (kidney) of athymic (nude) mice. Because the mice have no thymus, they have no
immunity and must be kept in a sterile environment.
After the transplant, the mice demonstrated immune response outside the sterile
environment and did not exhibit any rejection of the transplanted human tissue. This
demonstrated that the protein induced cell mediated immunity in the mice and the restored
immune system of the mice did not recognize the transplant as foreign.
If the protein from the human tissue "looked" foreign to the mouse immune
system, there would be massive immune response to that tissue. The absence of rejection
proves that the human thymus protein is identical or so nearly identical to the mouse
thymus protein that it is accepted "as self". Being conserved among species is
important because ingesting foreign protein can cause an antibody response, and in time
cause the foreign protein to have no effect on the immune response.
REFERENCES:
- Bonyhadi ML et al. "HIV Induces Thymus Depletion In Vivo", Nature,1993
June 24, 363(6431):728-32.
- Hays SM et al. – "Thymic Involution in Viable Motheaten Mice", Dev Immunology
1992; 3(3): 191-205.
- Hays, Beardsley. Immunologic Effects of Human Thymic Stromal Grafts and Cell Lines. 1984
Clinical Immunology and Immunopathology 33: 381
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