Cytomegalovirus in autoimmunity: T cell crossreactivity to viral antigen and autoantigen glutamic acid decarboxylase.

ABSTRACT: Antigens of pathogenic microbes that mimic autoantigens are thought to be responsible for the activation of autoreactive T cells. Viral infections have been associated with the development of the neuroendocrine autoimmune diseases type 1 diabetes and stiff-man syndrome, but the mechanism is unknown. These diseases share glutamic acid decarboxylase (GAD65) as a major autoantigen. We screened synthetic peptide libraries dedicated to bind to HLA-DR3, which predisposes to both diseases, using clonal CD4(+) T cells reactive to GAD65 isolated from a prediabetic stiff-man syndrome patient. Here we show that these GAD65-specific T cells crossreact with a peptide of the human cytomegalovirus (hCMV) major DNA-binding protein. This peptide was identified after database searching with a recognition pa

SUBMITTER: Hiemstra HS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC31166 | biostudies-literature | 2001 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature