The condition has been under investigation for thousands of years. The better we understand it, the more we see just how much there is to learn.
In the beginning, there was swelling, pain, heat, and redness. These cardinal signs of inflammation were described by Aulus Cornelius Celsus, a Roman encyclopedist, more than 2,000 years ago. Eventually, a fifth major sign emerged: loss of function.
Today the reaction Celsus described is called the acute inflammatory response, and it is known to involve hundreds of molecules and pathways that lead to healing when things go right and to infection or disease when they don’t. Scientists working in increments and leaps over centuries pieced together a detailed story of what inflammation is and how it works on the level of cells, proteins, and other molecules.
It…
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National Geographic (Digital) - 1 Issue, August 2024