Relationship between Aging, Immunoglobulin G, and Chronic Rhinosinusitis

Chronic sinusitis is one of the chronic illnesses that affect all age groups. As defined, it is "a common condition in which the cavities around nasal passages (sinuses) become inflamed and swollen — for at least eight weeks, despite treatment attempts."

Several scientific studies have studied chronic sinusitis and its related causes. In this context, this recently published research published in Research in Immunology: An International Journal investigated relationship between aging, immunoglobulin G, and chronic rhinosinusitis. As stated by researchers, the study’s objective is to "evaluate the effect of aging on immunoglobulin G (IgG) and its subclasses production in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis."

Immunoglobulin G (IgG) is a protein that makes up about 15% of total proteins in the human body. IgG plays an important role in the humoral immune response and it is majorly found in blood, lymph fluid, cerebrospinal fluid, and peritoneal fluid.

As stated, researchers "examined the sera levels of immunoglobulin G and its subclasses in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis closely implicated with aging." And their first notice is that "there was significant change in IgG level of patients in age of 20 -30 years in comparison with youngest subjects."

As the human gets older in age, there are different changes that affect the physiology and function of the nose. Researchers of this study made comparison between mice and human and noticed that "Aging in mice imposes a decrease in manufacture of precursor B cells in the bone marrow, but the counts of mature splenic B cells is preserved, since to increased life-span.In consistent with mouse B cells, human peripheral B cell populations decrease with aging."

Researchers showed that even that different studies have investigated the matter, but they "didn’t discuss about the effect of aging on IgG production and chronic rhinosinusitis." For that, researchers of this study inspected the relationship between IgG and age. "The age at which each of the IgG subgroups arrive at adult levels differs and every age group in childhood has its own normal values" they stated.

Researcher noticed in the current researcher that "there was significant elevation in IgG level of patients in group of 20 to 30 years. IgG2 and IgG3 increased with aging but IgG, IgG1and IgG4 did not indicate the same pattern."

The importance of the current research as stated by researchers is that "the defects discussed in the current article for IgG and its subclasses could lead to the discovery of procedures for improvement of humoral immune responses in the future."

I'm a writer specializing in scientific news, mainly medical studies. I have contributed articles to different news outlets.