PubMed Health⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

Carol M Artlett

Publications and source records attributed to Carol M Artlett.

7 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2003

HLA-DQA1 is not an apparent risk factor for microchimerism in patients with various autoimmune diseases and in healthy individuals.

OBJECTIVE: Microchimeric cells have been identified in lesions and peripheral blood of patients with systemic sclerosis (SSc) and idiopathic inflammatory myopathies (IIM), and HLA-DQA1*0501 is a risk factor for these diseases in some populations. Furthermore, DQA1*0501 has been associated with T lymphocyte microchimerism in SSc. To better define the strength of this association, we assessed the relationship among DQA1 alleles and microchimerism. METHODS: DNA from whole peripheral blood or magnetically sorted T cells was tested for microchimeric cells by polymerase chain reaction of the Y chromosome or of HLA-Cw in 87 SSc patients, 28 juvenile IIM patients, and 88 healthy controls. Thirty-seven mother-son pairs were also analyzed for microchimerism and DQA1*0501. RESULTS: We were unable to demonstrate that DQA1*0501 is associated with microchimerism in T lymphocytes or in whole peripheral blood DNA in patients with SSc or juvenile IIM or in healthy individuals. In the 37 mother-son pairs, we were unable to demonstrate an association of DQA1*0501 with microchimerism in peripheral blood DNA or T lymphocytes, and compatibility between the donor's and recipient's HLA alleles did not influence microchimerism in the recipient. CONCLUSION: These data suggest that HLA-DQA1 alleles do not appear to play a role in the persistence of microchimerism in the peripheral blood or T lymphocytes of patients with selected autoimmune diseases or in healthy individuals.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2003

Microchimerism and scleroderma: an update.

Microchimerism has been defined by the presence of a low number of circulating cells transferred from one individual to another. This transfer takes place naturally during pregnancy, between mother and fetus, or between fetuses in multigestational pregnancies. Furthermore, the establishment of microchimerism can also occur during blood transfusion, as well as during bone marrow and solid-organ transplants. Recently, microchimeric cells have been implicated in the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases, particularly systemic sclerosis. Studies have demonstrated an increased presence of microchimeric cells in peripheral blood and tissues from patients with systemic sclerosis, and, more recently, microchimeric cells were demonstrated to be specifically activated and capable of recognizing patient human leukocyte antigens.

Chimera↗
PubMed2002

Oligoclonal T cell expansion in the skin of patients with systemic sclerosis.

Fibrosis, microvascular fibroproliferative alterations, and autoantibody production are the main features of systemic sclerosis (SSc), and all of them can be explained by cytokine production by activated T cells. However, little is known about the role of T cells in the pathogenesis of SSc, and there is no information on the Ag(s) that elicits such activation. To determine whether T cells infiltrating the skin biopsies of patients with SSc are oligoclonal, beta-chain TCR transcripts from T cells infiltrating the skin of five patients with SSc of recent onset were amplified by either Vbeta-specific PCR or nonpalindromic adaptor PCR. The resulting PCR products were subsequently cloned and sequenced. High proportions of identical beta-chain TCR transcripts ranging from 43 to 90% of those sequenced were found in five patients, strongly suggesting the presence of oligoclonal T cells in these infiltrates. A dominant T cell clone was found to be clonally expanded in skin biopsies obtained from a single patient with SSc at three different times (0, 8, and 13 mo earlier) and from three different skin regions. beta-chain TCR transcripts from PBMC from normal donors (methodological control) were unique when compared with each other, typical for polyclonal populations of T cells. The finding of oligoclonal T cells infiltrating the skin of patients with SSc suggests that these T cells have undergone proliferation in situ in the skin and clonal expansion in response to as yet unidentified Ag(s). These results suggest that T cells are involved in the pathogenesis of the disease.

Adult↗
PubMed2002

Increased microchimeric CD4+ T lymphocytes in peripheral blood from women with systemic sclerosis.

Recent studies have demonstrated the presence of microchimeric cells in peripheral blood and skin lesions from patients with systemic sclerosis (SSc). In a previous study we found that some peripheral blood CD3+ cells from female patients with SSc contained male DNA. Here, peripheral blood samples from 47 patients with SSc (30 with diffuse cutaneous SSc and 17 with limited cutaneous SSc) and 22 healthy controls were sorted for CD4+ and CD8+ T cells. Both positively and negatively selected populations were analyzed for male DNA by quantitative PCR. Analysis of Y chromosome sequences in the sorted cells demonstrated the presence of microchimerism in 82.9% of SSc patients compared to 63.6% of controls. The numbers of CD4+ and CD8+ T cells were found to be significantly higher in the SSc patients than in controls. Furthermore, patients with dcSSc were observed to have significantly more CD4+ microchimeric T cells than the controls. In the CD8+ T-cell population, there was a trend toward more microchimeric cells in the patients but this did not reach significance. These results support the hypothesis that microchimeric CD4+ T cells may be involved in the pathogenesis of SSc.

CD4-Positive T-Lymphocytes↗
PubMed2002

Microchimerism in health and disease.

Microchimerism has been defined by the presence of a low number of circulating cells transferred from one individual to another. This transfer takes place naturally during pregnancy, between mother and fetus and/or between fetuses in multi-gestational pregnancies. Furthermore, the establishment of microchimerism can also occur during blood transfusion and organ transplants. Microchimeric cells have been implicated in health and disease. Microchimerism has been correlated with the hyporesponsiveness of the maternal immune system towards the fetal allograft and with the longevity of organ transplants. However, maternal microchimeric cells have been implicated in diseases of the neonate including neonatal graft-versus-host disease, severe combined immunodeficiency and erythema toxicum neonatorum. And more recently, microchimeric cells have been implicated in the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases including systemic sclerosis and myositis.

Antigen-Presenting Cells↗