{"id":562639,"date":"2025-10-22T15:30:03","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T18:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/?p=562639"},"modified":"2025-10-22T15:30:03","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T18:30:03","slug":"immune-cells-carry-microplastics-to-the-brain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/immune-cells-carry-microplastics-to-the-brain\/","title":{"rendered":"Immune cells carry microplastics to the brain"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Microplastics\u2014polymeric particles smaller than 5 micrometers (\u00b5m)\u2014can enter the bloodstream, where they are engulfed by immune cells, primarily neutrophils and macrophages, and can reach the brain, obstruct blood vessels, and cause neurological and behavioral changes (<a href=\"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/usp-team-identifies-microplastics-in-the-human-brain\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>see<\/em> Pesquisa FAPESP <em>issue n\u00ba 347<\/em><\/a>). Scientists from the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences and Peking University managed to track the path taken by fluorescent microplastics in the brains of awake mice. The 5 \u00b5m diameter particles reached the brain three hours after being ingested, diluted in water, by five mice. In another study, a team from the University of New Mexico, USA, examined tissue samples from 52 human bodies that underwent autopsies in 2016 and 2024. People who had been dead for a shorter time had more plastic particles than those who had been dead for longer (<em>Science Advances<\/em>, January 22; <em>Nature Medicine<\/em>, February 3).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ingested microplastics can reach the brain within hours","protected":false},"author":475,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1651],"tags":[236,260],"coauthors":[785],"class_list":["post-562639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-notes","tag-physiology","tag-public-health"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/475"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=562639"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562639\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":562640,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562639\/revisions\/562640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=562639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=562639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=562639"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=562639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}