A new approach to food allergy has been successfully tested in mice: a drug for asthma.

Anaphylaxis is a rapid and potentially life-threatening allergic reaction , and now a team of scientists has identified a new biological trigger behind it, as well as a drug that worked "surprisingly well" in mice to stop it.

It is a drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for some asthma patients , which in this case has been shown to almost completely eliminate life-threatening allergic reactions to food allergens in rodents.

This advance - still preliminary - could mean new protection for millions of people who suffer from food allergies , say scientists from Northwestern University, responsible for this research that is published this Thursday in the journal Science .

The discovery came after they identified, in mice, a previously unknown function of a gene called DPEP1, which they discovered is essential for regulating anaphylaxis . By using the asthma drug Zileuton to block the pathway involving this gene, the team almost completely eliminated allergic responses in mice, which were previously highly susceptible to food-induced anaphylaxis.

The mice were given peanut extract orally shortly after receiving Zileuton, while the team monitored their symptoms, the US university explained in a statement.

"It was really surprising how well Zileuton worked," admits Stephanie Eisenbarth, who details that after treatment with this drug, 95% of the mice showed virtually no symptoms of anaphylaxis . The treatment reversed their risk from 95% susceptibility to 95% protection, Adam Williams emphasizes.

The discovery of the new pathway came after several years of advanced genetic screening , a process in which generations of mice are bred to identify specific genes responsible for biological differences, such as susceptibility to food allergies.

Once scientists discovered that the DPEP1 gene controlled intestinal leukotrienes (inflammatory molecules already targeted by asthma drugs), they tested Zileuton.

Currently, there are only two FDA-approved treatments for certain food allergies , and there is no cure. One is an oral immunotherapy for peanut allergy, and the other is an expensive injection; neither works in all cases, the statement notes.

Zileuton could offer a new approach: a simple pill that temporarily protects allergy sufferers by blocking the body's anaphylactic pathway before it is activated. "This is a completely different and novel approach to treating food allergies, unlike anything we've tried before," Williams summarizes.

The findings also shed light on why some people test positive for food allergens but don't experience any symptoms when they consume those foods. The team launched a small, early-stage clinical trial in July to test whether blocking this newly identified pathway with Zileuton in humans is as effective as it was in mice.

The Northwestern study is published alongside another study from Yale University, which also discovered the leukotriene pathway that regulates food allergy in mice using a different approach.