Ehrlich Katherine B, Ross Kharah M, Chen Edith, Miller Gregory E
University of Georgia.
University of California at Los Angeles.
Dev Psychopathol. 2016 Nov;28(4pt2):1273-1283. doi: 10.1017/S0954579416000845. Epub 2016 Oct 3.
Accumulating evidence suggests that the experience of early life adversity is a risk factor for a range of poor outcomes across development, including poor physical health in adulthood. The biological embedding model of early adversity (Miller, Chen, & Parker, 2011) suggests that early adversity might become embedded within immune cells known as monocytes/macrophages, programming them to be overly aggressive to environmental stimuli and insensitive to inhibitory signals, creating a "proinflammatory phenotype" that increases vulnerability to chronic diseases across the life span. We tested this hypothesis in the present study. Adolescent girls (n = 147) had blood drawn every 6 months across a 2.5-year period. To assess inflammatory responses to challenge, their monocytes were stimulated in vitro with a bacterial product, and production of the cytokine interleukin-6 was quantified. Hydrocortisone was added to cultures to assess the cells' sensitivity to glucocorticoids' anti-inflammatory signal. Using cluster analyses, we found that early life adversity was associated with greater odds of displaying a proinflammatory phenotype characterized by relatively larger interleukin-6 responses and relatively less sensitivity to glucocorticoids. In contrast, ongoing social stress was not associated with increasing odds of being categorized in the proinflammatory cluster. These findings suggest that early life adversity increases the probability of developing a proinflammatory phenotype, which, if sustained, could forecast risk for health problems later in life.
越来越多的证据表明,早年经历逆境是整个发育过程中一系列不良后果的风险因素,包括成年后身体健康不佳。早期逆境的生物嵌入模型(米勒、陈和帕克,2011年)表明,早期逆境可能会嵌入被称为单核细胞/巨噬细胞的免疫细胞中,使它们对环境刺激反应过度,对抑制信号不敏感,从而产生一种“促炎表型”,增加一生中患慢性病的易感性。在本研究中,我们对这一假设进行了检验。在2.5年的时间里,青春期女孩(n = 147)每6个月抽取一次血液。为了评估对挑战的炎症反应,她们的单核细胞在体外被一种细菌产物刺激,并对细胞因子白细胞介素-6的产生进行定量。将氢化可的松添加到培养物中,以评估细胞对糖皮质激素抗炎信号的敏感性。通过聚类分析,我们发现早年经历逆境与表现出促炎表型的几率更高有关,这种表型的特征是白细胞介素-6反应相对较大,对糖皮质激素的敏感性相对较低。相比之下,持续的社会压力与被归类为促炎簇的几率增加无关。这些发现表明,早年经历逆境会增加出现促炎表型的可能性,如果这种表型持续存在,可能预示着日后出现健康问题的风险。