Inflammation and Depression: Too much of a good thing?

This event has ended.

We all know that our behaviour changes when we catch an infection. We feel fatigued or low in mood, our thoughts and actions slow down and we struggle to concentrate and find the motivation to complete tasks.

Once thought to be unimportant, non-specific responses, it is now clear that these ‘sickness behaviours’ are a deliberate and carefully coordinated response to infection designed to assist the immune system in quickly removing the infecting organism.

However, when inflammation is severe or prolonged, persistent activation of brain ‘sickness circuits’ can have more serious consequences including development of clinical depression and possibly chronic fatigue.

In this talk Professor Harrison will discuss how the immune system acts on the brain to rapidly change our behaviour, how this may lead to the development of depression and highlight development of new ‘immunotherapies’ designed to reverse these processes.