On average in the US, 1 in 10 babies is born prematurely and, in many cases, the cause is unknown. However, there could be many contributing factors, nearly 40% of pregnant people who deliver before 37 weeks exhibit chronic placental inflammation, which happens when the mother’s immune system attacks the placenta. If we understood this conversation, we could look for ways to predict and potentially prevent preterm birth. In the process, we are learning more about how spontaneous term labor happens (which is, somewhat shockingly, also a mystery).
Dr. Gomez-Lopez is trying to decipher the conversation between the immune system and pregnancy, and on January 29th’s episode of the podcast “Making Sense of Pregnancy”, she discusses her lab’s research on this topic.