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A big brain damages our health
A new study by Austrian and Swedish researchers suggests that a big brain costs a lot of energy and therefore weakens the immune system. So the price of wisdom is worse health?
Make a big brain smart?
Although it has long been assumed that there is a close relationship between brain size and intellectual performance, but according to scientists, this is overestimated until now. For example, researchers from the Institute of Applied Psychology at the University of Vienna in the journal "Neuroscience and Biobehaviorial Reviews" reported last year that a meta-analysis of 88 studies involving more than 8,000 subjects showed that there seems to be a weak correlation between brain size and the IQ (Intelligence Quotient) , A big brain does not necessarily have to be smart. But it may make it easier to get sick, as the Austrian biologist Alexander Kotrschal has now found out with colleagues.
Image: the_lightwriter - fotolia Larger organ needs more energy
This is because it consumes more energy than a small mind, which obviously lacks the innate immune system, the researchers report in the journal "Proceedings of the Royal Society B". According to the APA news agency, scientists compared the efficiency of the guppy's immune system with large and small brains by transplanting mutiblus with their associated mucus layer and pigment cells to these popular aquarium fish and then observing the rejection responses. According to the researchers, both brain and immune system have a high energy requirement. The high consumption of a large brain in relation to the body could cause the immune system to run low.
Stronger rejection reaction of the immune system
In the small-brain ornamental fish, the rejection response of the innate immune system, which already reacts at the first encounter with invaders and foreign bodies, was greater than with large-brain fish, the researchers said. "The tissue surrounding the transplanted dandruff first swelled a bit, then the mucus layer became cloudy and finally the pigment cells of the transplanted dandruff were digested by the recipient's immune system and disappeared," said Kotrschal, a member of the Department of Zoology, Stockholm University (Sweden ) and the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Comparative Behavioral Research at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna, opposite the APA. He reported that after just over a week, all foreign material had been "digested" down to the actual scale and overgrown with proprietary material. "The foreign dandruff will then permanently remain part of the recipient," says Kotrschal.
Wisdom has its price
The scientists performed another three weeks after the first transplant to see if the specific (acquired) immune system, which can remember the appearance of foreign bodies and fight them quickly and effectively at the next meeting, in small and large fish Brains responded differently violently. They realized that was not the case. According to the researchers, these results show that investing in the development of a larger brain is at the expense of the innate but not the acquired immune system. They explained: "Smart fish obviously pay for their wisdom with a lower-quality immune system." (Ad)