Rogue Immune Cells Tied to MS Point to New Drug Target

Researchers identified a possible culprit for immune cells resistance to regulation in a small study of multiple sclerosis patients, suggesting a potential new target for treatment.

T-cells, when working properly, are an important part of the immune systems arsenal for fighting off invaders. In MS patients, however, they can ignore the controlling orders from regulatory cells and attack the central nervous system, researchers found in a study published today in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

Scientists at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle identified a protein called interleukin-6, or IL-6, as a reason for those cells going rogue in patients with relapsing-remitting MS, the most common form of the disease.

We identified a new problem in multiple sclerosis that hadnt been identified before, Jane Hoyt Buckner, an author of the paper and associate director of Virginia Masons Benaroya Research Institute, said today in a telephone interview. Then we were able to show why that happens in MS patients, which is this enhanced responsiveness to the cytokine IL-6.

People with relapsing-remitting MS have more receptors for IL-6 on the surface of their T-cells, suggesting IL-6 may be a good target for therapy, Buckner said.

More than 2.1 million people worldwide have MS, a disorder of the central nervous system that can cause numbness of the limbs, trouble walking and vision loss, according to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. The most common form is relapsing-remitting, characterized by sporadic attacks that degrade neurological function, followed by periods of recovery.

In the study published today, researchers looked at blood samples from 24 patients with relapsing-remitting MS who werent taking immunomodulatory therapies. In addition to observing the implication of IL-6, the scientists also noted cellular differences among patients based on the severity of their disease in the previous two years.

In people with well-controlled or mild MS, we didnt see this escape of T-cells from regulatory control, Buckner said. But we did see it in patients who had more active disease over the previous two years.

That suggests that T-cells resistance to regulation could be a helpful biomarker for determining the course an MS patients disease might take in the future, Buckner said. She cautioned that studies would need to be done to test the hypothesis as a predictive tool.

Such information about disease course may help doctors decide which medicine to prescribe. If a patients disease looked to be more active, a physician might opt for a more aggressive therapy, such as Biogen Idec Inc. (BIIB)s Tysabri, over a milder therapy such as the companys Avonex.

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Rogue Immune Cells Tied to MS Point to New Drug Target