Press releases
Please quote Nature Immunology as the source of these items.
The August 2007 issue of Nature Immunology is available online.
August 2007
Arresting autoimmunity
A study to be published online this week in Nature Immunology reveals how T lymphocytes survive to induce several types of autoimmune disease, including multiple sclerosis.
Working with a mouse version of multiple sclerosis, Gang Pei and colleagues study a protein called beta-arrestin 1, a factor known to regulate gene expression in all cells. Pei’s team reports that beta-arrestin 1 helps promote survival of T lymphocytes, which increases the duration of inflammation. In the absence of beta-arrestin 1 a critical factor required for T lymphocyte survival is not produced. Consistently, T lymphocytes lacking beta-arrestin 1 survive less well and cause much less brain inflammation in a mouse model of multiple sclerosis.
Demonstrating a role for beta-arrestin 1 in prolonging survival of aggressive T lymphocytes associated with autoimmune disease provides a possible target for reducing such diseases. Whether blocking the function of beta-arrestin 1 will help multiple sclerosis patients, however, remains a question for future investigation.
Critical regulation of CD4+ T cell survival and autoimmunity by β-arrestin 1
Yufeng Shi, Yan Feng, Jiuhong Kang, Chang Liu, Zhenxin Li, Dangsheng Li, Wei Cao, Ju Qiu, Zhengliang Guo, Enguang Bi, Lei Zang, Chuanzhen Lu, Jingwu Z Zhang & Gang Pei
Published online: 8 July 2007 | doi 10.1038/ni1489
