Neural circuits mechanisms modulate inflammation, immune response, and homeostasis through regulation of neuro-immune-endocrine networks, the cytokines synthesis and release. Cytokine levels can increase significantly in the brain in response to infection or injury, or by entering the brain during periods of stress-induced opening of the blood–brain barrier. Elevated brain TNF levels occur during brain inflammation, ischemia, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and multiple sclerosis. All of those cytokines event above are modulated via neural circuits mechanisms.

Currently there is no cure for neuromuscular disorders and a lot of other neurological disorders, current therapies including acupuncture treatment are only to relieve symptoms for quality of life. Neural Circuits modulate inflammation, immune response, homeostasis, therefore, neural circuits signaling pathways are important transduction pathways to explore therapeutic and preventive biomarkers. Inflammation is the major event of neurological disorders, neural circuits modulation functions are reduced in neurological diseases including neuromuscular diseases and other system inflammatory disorders. The impact of acupuncture on neural circuits system is obvious. The best acupuncture treatment modalities, which are clinically proven effective, are perfect clinical models for clinical translational research regarding reflex neural circuits system signaling pathways. 

The mammalian immune system and the nervous system coevolved under the influence of infection and sterile injury. Knowledge of homeostatic mechanisms by which the nervous system controls organ function was originally applied to the cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, musculoskeletal, and other body systems. Development of advanced neurophysiological and immunological techniques recently enabled the study of reflex neural circuits that maintain immunological homeostasis, and are essential for health in mammals.

Reflex neural circuits are the basic organizational units of the nervous system, capable of rapid and precise responses to countless of physiologic challenges in both health and disease. The mammalian nervous system encodes many different forms of pain, from those that arise as a result of short-term low-grade interactions with noxious thermal, chemical, or mechanical sources to more serious forms of pain induced by trauma and disease. And reflex neural circuits encode these types of pain.

Inflammation and immunity are regulated by reflex neural circuits. Recent basic science research has demonstrated that a reflex neural circuits, termed the inflammatory reflex, modulates systemic and regional inflammation. Reflex neural circuits regulate cytokine release to prevent potentially damaging inflammation and maintain homeostasis. In the inflammatory reflex, sensory input elicited by infection or injury travels through the afferent vagus nerve to integrative regions in the brainstem, and efferent nerves carry outbound signals that terminate in the spleen and other tissues. Failure of reflex neural circuits mechanisms in mammals contributes to non-resolving inflammation and disease.

An electrical implant like a pacemaker has been invented by researchers to alleviate the symptoms of diseases such as Crohn’s disease and rheumatoid arthritis by controlling the body’s neural circuits. With this device, patients would no longer need to take any pills.

Rheumatoid arthritis is a crippling autoimmune disease that causes chronic inflammation in joints. Painful swelling can destroy the major and minor joints of the hands, feet, and extremities, leading to disability, fatigue, and immobility. Currently there are no cures for rheumatoid arthritis. The basic problem in rheumatoid arthritis, and other autoimmune diseases, is that immune system cells begin to attack the body’s own tissues.  In rheumatoid arthritis, high cytokine levels accumulate in the cartilage and other inflamed joint tissues to produce pain and destroy tissues. One of the major toxic cytokines is termed TNF. Treatments that specifically block the action of cytokines have shown major promise in alleviating the disease in some autoimmune patients. In healthy people, the nervous system provides a precise mechanism of checks and balances that maintains the levels of TNF within a safe range. For unknown reasons, in rheumatoid arthritis these vagus nerve signals fail, and the resulting brake failure causes an excessive production of TNF. Restoring the brakes on inflammation with computerized nerve stimulation is promising. Researchers are studying whether it may be possible to modulate the inflammatory reflex for treating a number of diseases, since the basic mechanisms of dysregulated inflammation also contribute to the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease, congestive heart failure, arthritis, shock, sepsis, and other syndromes.

The clinical effects of acupuncture on pain and inflammation relief have been well documented. Scientific researches have demonstrated that acupuncture activates inhibitory neural circuits for pain and inflammation relief. The action of acupuncture on vagus nerve stimulation has similar mechanisms as the restoring the brakes on inflammation with computerized nerve stimulation.

It is popular now to develop novel treatment for inflammatory diseases, such as neuropathy and neuromuscular diseases, rheumatoid arthritis and other autoimmune disorders, through basic science research and clinical translational research targeting on reflex neural circuits. It is also possible to target these neural pathways using electrical nerve stimulators and pharmacological agents to hasten the resolution of inflammation and provide therapeutic benefit. And acupuncture clinical translational research could explore novel biomarkers as targets for preventive and therapeutic treatment. It is important that a well established and clinically effective acupuncture treatment modality should be used as a clinical study model. RUI acupuncture, the 7th generation acupuncture at Acupuncture Center USA and Arthritis and Pain Treatment Center, is a well established acupuncture treatment that is clinically proven to be effective. Therefore RUI acupuncture is a practical clinical translational research model in order to develop novel biomarkers as targets for therapeutic and preventive treatment.