Abstract
Incidence of autoimmune diseases is rising rapidly in the developed world and treatment of such diseases will be a major burden on Government health resources of the future. Whether systemic or organ-specific, immune cell destruction of the target tissue normally requires co-operative interaction of a many distinct immune cells. Detailed knowledge of the cells and signal pathways involved in tissue destruction is paramount to the design of novel therapeutics. Several organ-specific autoimmune diseases e.g. multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis and type 1 diabetes have long been attributed to T cell-mediated destruction of the target tissue. However, recent reports from both murine models and man have suggested that B cells are principal players in these T cell-mediated diseases. In this review, we discuss the evidence that supports a link between B cells and the autoaggressive T cell response in type 1 diabetes and how accumulating evidence suggests targeting B cells may offer a novel therapeutic strategy for this autoimmune disease.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 130-8 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | Inflammation & allergy drug targets |
| Volume | 8 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| Publication status | Published - 2009 |
Keywords
- Animals
- Antibodies, Monoclonal
- Antibodies, Monoclonal, Murine-Derived
- Autoantibodies
- Autoantigens
- B-Lymphocytes
- Diabetes Mellitus, Type 1
- Humans
- Immune Tolerance
- Immunotherapy
- Islets of Langerhans
- Mice
- Mice, Inbred NOD
- Signal Transduction
- T-Lymphocytes