Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic autoimmune disease of the central nervous system. In MS, the body’s own immune cells attack the nerve fibres in the brain and spinal cord, disrupting their ability to communicate with each other. The disease can lead to severe neurological disabilities such as sensory problems, pain and signs of paralysis.
Researchers at the University of Zurich and the University Hospital of Zurich, together with colleagues at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, have now discovered a key aspect in the disease’s development. They have shown that specific T cells alone are not responsible causing inflammation and lesions in the brain; B cells, a different type of immune cell, also play a role. These cells can activate T cells in the blood.
“We were able to show for the first time that certain B cells – the cells of the immune system that produce antibodies – activate the specific T cells that cause inflammation in the brain and nerve cell lesions,” Roland Martin, director of the Clinical Research Priority Program Multiple Sclerosis at UZH, said in a press release.
Their findings not only explain how new MS drugs take effect, but they also pave the way for new approaches in basic research and therapy for MS.
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