Gut Feelings: How Our Nervous and Immune Systems Communicate

Whether awake, asleep, focused or distracted, the brain continuously monitors and regulates the body’s internal state — a process known as interoception. An emerging field of research studies how this extends to the immune system, showing that the brain can sense infection, inflammation and even early tumor formation through communication with neurons in the gut.

In this Presidential Lecture, Daniel Mucida will discuss surprising findings from his lab and others showing that gut-based neural circuits detect signals from infectious microbes. This process helps coordinate protective immune responses and intestinal recovery. Beyond this role in enteric neurons, his lab has begun exploring how the brain senses gut pathogens and how this sensing shapes not only sickness behavior but also immune system function. The group is now extending these questions to other conditions, with implications for the management of inflammatory and infectious diseases.

Mucida received his undergraduate degree from the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Brazil and his Ph.D. jointly from the University of São Paulo and New York University. After postdoctoral work at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology in San Diego, he joined Rockefeller University in 2010 and became a tenured professor and Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator in 2021. The Mucida lab studies how the intestinal immune system protects against infection while maintaining tolerance to food, harmless substances and commensal microbes — work that informs the understanding of inflammatory bowel disease, food allergies and colorectal cancer.