Future Research and Treatment Possibilities
One of the reasons the subfornical organ, along with all circumventricular organs, is increasingly being studied is its potential for novel pharmaceutical due to the lack of a blood-brain barrier. The blood-brain barrier has long been an obstacle in drug delivery to the brain, as only certain molecules are transported across the endothelial cells that form tight junctions along the vasculature in the brain.
Current research in this area has focused on a less naturally occurring component of the brain that lacks a blood-brain barrier: certain types of high grade gliomas. The rapidly dividing tumorous glial cells require rapidly formed blood vessels, and as a result, the endothelial cell tight junctions do not form, and the vessels are "leaky". Treatment targeted towards these tumors are trending towards medication internalized in some sort of vesicle, with the size of the vesicle determining where in the body they collect. The vesicles are then coated with various ligands/receptors (for gliomas, most commonly used is the folate receptor mechanism as it is highly expressed by glioma cells) to bind to their target cells and release the contained medication. This approach to drug delivery in the brain could easily be replicated in the SFO, and reduce abnormalities seen in the SFO as well as the physiological mechanisms it plays a role in.
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