An immune system messenger molecule that normally helps quiet inflammation could be an effective tool against multiple sclerosis (MS). Neurology researchers led by Abdolmohamad Rostami, M.D., Ph.D., professor and chair of the Department of Neurology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University and the Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience in Philadelphia, have found that the protein interkeukin-27 (IL-27) helped block the onset or reverse symptoms in animals with an MS-like disease.
The results suggest that IL-27 may someday be part of a therapy to temper over-active immune responses, which are thought to be at the heart of MS, an autoimmune disease (in which the body attacks its own tissue) affecting the central nervous system. The Jefferson neuroscientists report their findings November 11, 2007 in the journal Nature Immunology. The paper first appears in an advance online publication.