0000000000124445
AUTHOR
Jack P. Antel
Pro-inflammatory T helper 17 directly harms oligodendrocytes in neuroinflammation.
Significance Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a neuroinflammatory, demyelinating disease that represents one of the most frequent causes of irreversible disability in young adults. Treatment options to halt disability are limited. We discovered that T helper (Th)17 cells in contact with oligodendrocytes produce higher levels of glutamate and induce significantly greater oligodendrocyte damage than their Th2 counterpart. Blockade of CD29, which is linked to glutamate release pathways and expressed in high levels on Th17 cells, preserved human oligodendrocyte processes from Th17-mediated injury. Our data thus provide evidence for the direct and deleterious attack of Th17 cells on the myelin compart…
Dimethyl Fumarate Treatment Mediates an Anti-Inflammatory Shift in B Cell Subsets of Patients with Multiple Sclerosis
Abstract The therapeutic mode of action of dimethyl fumarate (DMF), approved for treating patients with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis, is not fully understood. Recently, we and others demonstrated that Ab-independent functions of distinct B cell subsets are important in mediating multiple sclerosis (MS) relapsing disease activity. Our objective was to test whether and how DMF influences both the phenotype and functional responses of disease-implicated B cell subsets in patients with MS. High-quality PBMC were obtained from relapsing-remitting MS patients prior to and serially after initiation of DMF treatment. Multiparametric flow cytometry was used to monitor the phenotype and fun…