[HTML][HTML] Autoantibody repertoire in APECED patients targets two distinct subgroups of proteins

D Fishman, K Kisand, C Hertel, M Rothe… - Frontiers in …, 2017 - frontiersin.org
D Fishman, K Kisand, C Hertel, M Rothe, A Remm, M Pihlap, P Adler, J Vilo, A Peet
Frontiers in immunology, 2017frontiersin.org
High titer autoantibodies produced by B lymphocytes are clinically important features of
many common autoimmune diseases. APECED patients with deficient autoimmune
regulator (AIRE) gene collectively display a broad repertoire of high titer autoantibodies,
including some which are pathognomonic for major autoimmune diseases. AIRE deficiency
severely reduces thymic expression of gene-products ordinarily restricted to discrete
peripheral tissues, and developing T cells reactive to those gene-products are not …
High titer autoantibodies produced by B lymphocytes are clinically important features of many common autoimmune diseases. APECED patients with deficient autoimmune regulator (AIRE) gene collectively display a broad repertoire of high titer autoantibodies, including some which are pathognomonic for major autoimmune diseases. AIRE deficiency severely reduces thymic expression of gene-products ordinarily restricted to discrete peripheral tissues, and developing T cells reactive to those gene-products are not inactivated during their development. However, the extent of the autoantibody repertoire in APECED and its relation to thymic expression of self-antigens are unclear. We here undertook a broad protein array approach to assess autoantibody repertoire in APECED patients. Our results show that in addition to shared autoantigen reactivities, APECED patients display high inter-individual variation in their autoantigen profiles, which collectively are enriched in evolutionarily conserved, cytosolic and nuclear phosphoproteins. The APECED autoantigens have two major origins; proteins expressed in thymic medullary epithelial cells and proteins expressed in lymphoid cells. These findings support the hypothesis that specific protein properties strongly contribute to the etiology of B cell autoimmunity.
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