Osteopontin: role in MS relapses

Bird, Lucy

doi:10.1038/nri2004

Research Highlight
Published: 15 December 2006

Autoimmunity

Osteopontin: role in MS relapses

Lucy Bird

Nature Reviews Immunology volume 7, page 7 (2007)Cite this article

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Osteopontin is a pleiotropic cytokine that participates in a wide range of biological processes, such as bone remodelling, cancer and inflammation. Increased expression of osteopontin has been detected at sites of pathology in several autoimmune diseases, including in the brain lesions of patients with multiple sclerosis during disease relapse. This, together with the observation that mice deficient in osteopontin develop a milder form of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE; an animal model of multiple sclerosis) with fewer relapses, prompted the authors to assess whether osteopontin contributes to disease progression.

Using three models of multiple sclerosis, they showed that administration of recombinant osteopontin could indeed exacerbate disease. In osteopontin-deficient mice, a daily injection of osteopontin after the first phase of spontaneous remission of EAE triggered immediate relapse and led to severe fatal disease. Administration of osteopontin also worsened disease in wild-type mice with a relapsing–remitting model of EAE.

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH PAPER

Hur, E. M. et al. Osteopontin-induced relapse and progression of autoimmune brain disease through enhanced survival of activated T cells. Nature Immunol. 3 December 2006 (doi: 10.1038/ni1415).

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