Simply being exposed to a sick avatar in a virtual reality environment is enough to trigger a measurable immune response in humans. This is what a multidisciplinary research team from the CHUV and the University of Geneva (UNIGE) has demonstrated.
These results, published in
Nature Neuroscience, open promising avenues for better understanding the brain's influence on immune defense, offering new perspectives for research on placebo effects, psychosomatic disorders, and the modulation of the immune response.
The simple visual perception of a sick avatar on a screen is enough to trigger a measurable immune response in humans.
© CHUV
When confronted on a screen with a purely virtual threat of infection, the brain of a healthy individual triggers an immune response similar to that of a person who is actually infected. This is what a multidisciplinary research team from the CHUV and the University of Geneva (UNIGE) has demonstrated.
The team led by Prof. Andrea Serino, Director of the MySpace Lab (CHUV University Service of Neurorehabilitation and the Institution of Lavigny) and Associate Professor at the Faculty of Biology and Medicine (FBM) of UNIL, and Prof. Camilla Jandus, Head of Laboratory at the Department of Pathology and Immunology and the Centre for Inflammation Research at the UNIGE Faculty of Medicine and member of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, shows that simply being exposed to a sick avatar in a virtual reality environment is enough to trigger a measurable immune response in humans.
Immune markers typical of a response to a real infection were indeed present in the participants' blood.
This research, led by Dr. Sara Trabanelli (UNIGE) and Dr. Michel Akselrod (CHUV-UNIL), was published in
Nature Neuroscience. It reveals a previously unknown dialogue between the brain and the immune system: a defensive response initiated not by a real pathogen, but by the brain's mere anticipation of an infectious threat.
A new brain-immune communication pathway
Thus, it is possible to stimulate the brain virtually so that it sends signals to the immune system and asks it to mobilize to defend itself against a pathogen.
Various experiments were conducted by CHUV and UNIGE on approximately 250 participants. They were confronted in virtual reality with human avatars, some of which showed visual signs of infection, while others had a neutral or frightened face. For 15 minutes, the subject observed on a screen the face of a person who approaches and shows signs of a classic infection, such as chickenpox, for example. Their reaction was monitored through several means, including electroencephalogram, MRI, and blood analysis.
Result: the approach of an infected avatar in virtual reality is enough to activate brain regions linked to threat detection and immune regulation. Even more surprising: immune markers typical of a response to a real infection were indeed present in the participants' blood.
The brain anticipates infectious danger
To compare this response to that of a real immune activation, another group of participants received a vaccine. The immune responses observed in both cases—virtual exposure or vaccination—showed surprising similarities. For example, comparing a subject vaccinated against the flu and a subject exposed to virtual reality reveals that several biomarkers of the immune response measurable in the blood are comparable in both real and virtual infection.
This study therefore reveals a capacity of the brain to anticipate an infectious danger and engage the body in a defensive response, even before a real pathogen intervenes. It paves the way for a renewed understanding of the interactions between the central nervous system and the immune system.
Promising therapeutic avenues
These discoveries open promising avenues for better understanding the brain's influence on immune defense, offering new perspectives for research on placebo effects, psychosomatic disorders, and the modulation of the immune response. In the long term, virtual reality could even become a therapeutic tool to strengthen or inhibit certain immune responses, support vaccine efficacy, or help desensitize allergic individuals.