{"id":1981,"date":"2022-12-27T13:53:46","date_gmt":"2022-12-27T19:53:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/?p=1981"},"modified":"2022-12-27T13:53:48","modified_gmt":"2022-12-27T19:53:48","slug":"persistent-post-covid-19-smell-loss-is-associated-with-immune-cell-infiltration-and-altered-gene-expression-in-olfactory-epithelium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/2022\/12\/27\/persistent-post-covid-19-smell-loss-is-associated-with-immune-cell-infiltration-and-altered-gene-expression-in-olfactory-epithelium\/","title":{"rendered":"Persistent post\u2013COVID-19 smell loss is associated with immune cell infiltration and altered gene expression in olfactory epithelium"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"panel body-content\"><div class=\"panel__container\">\n<p>(<a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/scitranslmed.add0484\">Science<\/a>) SARS-CoV-2 causes profound changes in the sense of smell, including total smell loss. Although these alterations are often transient, many patients with COVID-19 exhibit olfactory dysfunction that lasts months to years. Although animal and human autopsy studies have suggested mechanisms driving acute anosmia, it remains unclear how SARS-CoV-2 causes persistent smell loss in a subset of patients. To address this question, we analyzed olfactory epithelial samples collected from 24 biopsies, including from nine patients with objectively quantified long-term smell loss after COVID-19. This biopsy-based approach revealed a diffuse infiltrate of T cells expressing interferon-\u03b3 and a shift in myeloid cell population composition, including enrichment of CD207<sup>+<\/sup>\u00a0dendritic cells and depletion of anti-inflammatory M2 macrophages. Despite the absence of detectable SARS-CoV-2 RNA or protein, gene expression in the barrier supporting cells of the olfactory epithelium, termed sustentacular cells, appeared to reflect a response to ongoing inflammatory signaling, which was accompanied by a reduction in the number of olfactory sensory neurons relative to olfactory epithelial sustentacular cells. These findings indicate that T cell\u2013mediated inflammation persists in the olfactory epithelium long after SARS-CoV-2 has been eliminated from the tissue, suggesting a mechanism for long-term post\u2013COVID-19 smell loss.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Science) SARS-CoV-2 causes profound changes in the sense of smell, including total smell loss. Although these alterations are often transient, many patients with COVID-19 exhibit olfactory dysfunction that lasts months to years. Although animal and human autopsy studies have suggested mechanisms driving acute anosmia, it remains unclear how SARS-CoV-2 causes persistent smell loss in a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-clinical-considerations","category-published-research"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1981"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1981\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1982,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1981\/revisions\/1982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}