Innate Immunity as an Executor of the Programmed Death of Individual Organisms for the Benefit of the Entire Population

Abstract

In humans, over-activation of innate immunity in response to viral or bacterial infections often causes severe illness and death. Furthermore, similar mechanisms related to innate immunity can cause pathogenesis and death in sepsis, massive trauma (including surgery and burns), ischemia/reperfusion, some toxic lesions, and viral infections including COVID-19. Based on the reviewed observations, we suggest that such severe outcomes may be manifestations of a controlled suicidal strategy protecting the entire population from the spread of pathogens and from dangerous pathologies rather than an aberrant hyperstimulation of defense responses. We argue that innate immunity may be involved in the implementation of an altruistic programmed death of an organism aimed at increasing the well-being of the whole community. We discuss possible ways to suppress this atavistic program by interfering with innate immunity and suggest that combating this program should be a major goal of future medicine.

Six Functions of Respiration: Isn’t It Time to Take Control over ROS Production in Mitochondria, and Aging Along with It?

“…Multiple positive effects of MTAs have also been described in various models by other research teams (for detailed reviews, see [ 37 , 83 , 122 ]). One of the first MTA, MitoQ, a conjugate of ubiquinone with triphenylphosphonium cation, reduced markers of acute hepatic and renal dysfunction [ 123 ] and cardiomyopathy [ 124 ] in LPS-infected rats.…”

“…In eukaryotes, the excessive production of mtROS leads, in some cases, to an over-reaction of the whole organism to the stress or damage; see [ 37 ] for a review. In many cases, such reactions end up with the death of an organism.…”

“…Injection of mitochondria into the bloodstream at least partially resembles sepsis because mitochondria, owing to their bacterial origin, are recognized by immune cells by the same receptors as bacterial pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs). In addition, some mitochondrial components are recognized as damage-associated molecular patterns (DAMPs), which signal the body of massive tissue damage, as occurs after severe trauma or surgery [ 37 , 131 , 132 ]. Pretreatment of mice with SkQ1 almost completely prevented mortality caused by intravenous administration of mitochondria ( Figure 4 B).…”

“…The mtROS signaling interferes with other important intracellular signaling pathways and initiates reactions that aim to diminish the possible damage from mitochondrial malfunction [ 24 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 ]. However, these reactions, specifically in response to acute stress or trauma, can be excessive and even fatal, resulting in the death of the organism; see [ 37 ] for a review.…”

Innate Immunity and Phenoptosis

“…In this note, we will briefly present the hypothesis that activation of innate immune system serves as a primary mechanism for phenoptosis execution. A more detailed analysis of the literature in this area was published by us earlier [ 4 ].…”