Journal Club Recap: March 29, 2019

March 29, 2019: At Journal Club, our experts sat down to discuss a paper on immunoglobulins and MS.

Rojas et al 2019 - Recirculating Intestinal IgA-Producing Cells Regulate Neuroinflammation via IL-10

mmunoglobulins are a class of proteins found in the blood and in the cells of the immune system that work to neutralize infectious bacteria and viruses. This paper focused on a particular subset of immunoglobulins, IgA. IgA is usually found in the intestines, but other studies have also found this protein outside of the gut. This group of researchers focused on understanding why IgA is found in the central nervous system (CNS) during periods of infection. Using the animal model of multiple sclerosis, EAE, they discovered that there were fewer molecules of IgA in the gut and more in the CNS when symptoms of EAE were developing. This research implies that IgA may play a role in periods of relapse in MS patients, however further work is needed to fully understand the function of this protein in MS.