Scientists have discovered a group of brainstem cells that help keep blood pressure stable as the body moves through daily activities.
A normal average blood pressure reading may not tell the whole story. Scientists are finding that the size of the ups and downs between one moment and the next can matter just as much. When those short-term swings become too large, they are strongly linked to a higher risk of heart disease, stroke, and brain injury.
Now, researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine have identified a set of brainstem nerve cells that appears to act like a built-in buffering system for blood pressure. The brainstem helps run essential automatic functions, and this newly identified group of cells seems to keep blood pressure from changing too sharply as the body moves through ordinary transitions such as sleeping, waking, standing, and exercising. In simple terms, the study points to a brain circuit that may help the body smooth out constant pressure changes before they become harmful.
This is important because blood pressure is never truly fixed. It shifts from minute to minute as the body adjusts to posture, movement, stress, and rest. Doctors have traditionally focused on the average reading, but growing evidence suggests that stability itself may be a separate marker of health.
“What we found is that a loss of just a few hundred nerve cells leads to unstable blood pressure even though the mean blood pressure was normal,” said UVA’s Stephen Abbott, PhD, the lead investigator of the study. “This shows that the system that keeps blood pressure steady from moment to moment is no longer working.”
Links to Neurological Disease
Scientists have already observed damage or dysfunction in these same brain cells in people with multiple system atrophy, a rare and fatal neurological disorder related to Parkinson’s disease that is known for causing severe problems with blood pressure control.
The new results suggest that similar brain mechanisms could also contribute to unstable blood pressure in other conditions, even when standard measurements show that a person’s average blood pressure appears normal. The researchers say this insight could eventually lead to treatments designed to reduce dangerous blood pressure fluctuations and limit the harm they can cause.
“Our work emphasizes a new appreciation for how we think about blood pressure problems,” Abbott said. “It’s not just about lowering the numbers – it’s about keeping blood pressure stable from moment to moment.”
Reference: “Control of Blood Pressure Variability Across Behavioral States by Brainstem Adrenergic Neurons” by George M.P.R. Souza, Harsha Thakkalapally, Faye E. Berry, Leah F. Wisniewski, Ulrich M. Atongazi, Daniel S. Stornetta and Stephen B.G. Abbott, 13 January 2026, Circulation Research.
DOI: 10.1161/CIRCRESAHA.125.326792
The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health, grant HL148004.
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