NEW YORK (August 04, 2015) — New insight into how the intestines repair themselves after daily attacks from microbes and other environmental triggers could lead to innovative approaches to treating inflammatory bowel disease, according to new research by Weill Cornell Medical College investigators. The findings, published Aug. 4 in PNAS, reveal a mechanism that allows the single layer of cells that line the inside of the intestines, called the gut epithelium, to signal the immune system to repair tissue damage caused by the daily onslaught of microbes and other environmental factors that the body encounters. Because a defect in that repair system underlies Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, the two primary forms of IBD, restoring tissue-protective repair mechanisms could reduce the diseases' hallmarks, chronic inflammation and tissue damage.
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