DNA Vaccine May Treat Multiple Sclerosis 127
GSASoftware writes "Multiple sclerosis is a serious, as-yet incurable neurological disease which causes blindness, paralysis and other serious symptoms. In a new development, a neuroimmunology researcher in Montreal has developed a therapeutic DNA vaccine. The cause of the disease is not fully understood, but it appears to be auto-immune. If a DNA vaccine can be an effective therapy for this auto-immune disease, is it possible that DNA vaccines could treat other auto-immune diseases like Crohn's, eczema, and others?"
Re:Always a possibility (Score:5, Informative)
This is are very interesting and promising news for me. Perhaps in a couple of years I won't need my daily anti-fatigue pills, weekly interferon beta 1a shots, and those occasional hospital corticoid shock treatments. Probably I'll never recover for the disabilities I've already got, but at least I won't develop any further because of MS!
Re:Well, I am holding my breath (Score:2, Informative)
Re:double entendre (Score:3, Informative)
"DNA vaccine" (Score:5, Informative)
DNA is the active ingredient of the vaccine, if they mean what people usually mean by "DNA vaccine".
To vaccinate against a pathogen, you'd take some gene from it that codes for a surface protein, inject that DNA into muscle cells, let them express it and produce the protein, and the immune system would learn to react.
Which leaves plenty of confusion, since the goal of MS therapy would be to turn off the immune response to myelin, not to create an immune response.
This isn't about gene therapy.
Re:Why do they call it Multiple Sclerosis.... (Score:3, Informative)
Multiple Sclerosis = Multiple areas of scarring in the CNS (Brain, Spinal Cord, Optic Nerves)
Re:Always a possibility (Score:1, Informative)
Basically the theory, which originated from the observation that autoimmune diseases were vastly more prevalent in the developed world, goes that there has been a natural selection for parasites that manage to downregulate the immune system (so as to stop it from attacking them). This made a corresponding natural selection for more aggressive human immune systems. Basically you had somewhat of a downregulation aggression race which was pretty balanced. Then, in one generation, the parasites were wiped out, leaving many humans with way too aggressive immune systems.
Who knows, but it does seem to be quiet a hot research topic (although it is currently mostly focused on the likes of Crohns), with several articles in medical journals and at least two companies into producing worms. Here's a link [medpagetoday.com] to some results with respect to MS.
Good luck with your disease.
Directions in MS research (Score:2, Informative)
> The cause of the disease is not fully understood, but it appears to
> be auto-immune.
It is auto-immune; there is no question about that, and there hasn't
been for a few decades now.
I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 2000; I got my first
symptoms when I was 19 years old while I was overseas (imagine waking
up one morning with half your vision gone in one eye). My mother has
MS too. That there is a genetic factor has always been
known. Typically, if a close relative has MS, you have about a 3%
chance of developing the condition yourself (I won that lottery). One
popular theory is that there is a substantial number of genes that
have to possess certain characteristics in order for a person to be
predisposed to developing the condition, and then exposure to some
pathogen triggers the immune system to learn to attack the myelin
around the axons. MS is so strange a disease that experts are not
quick to jump onto any one bandwagon in terms of what actually causes
MS.
The recent findings by Dr. Stephen Hauser's team have identified the
IL2R and IL7R genes as specifically involved, and it will likely be
the case that several more genes will be correlated. It is only very
recently have actual genes been linked to the condition (and my
personal belief is that the anti-stem cell research position of the
U.S. government has been and will continue to be a major hindrance in
genetic research on MS, but that is for another thread).
There is more good news; Dr. Giovanna Bersellino's team has recently
identified another subgroup of suppressor cells that tend to be
diminished in patients with MS:
http://idw-online.de/pages/de/news221805 [idw-online.de]
The medication I am currently taking (interferon beta-1a injections)
is the best known-safe treatment we have, but it really is not that
much different from what has been being used since 1993. The thing is,
nobody really knows exactly why it works; the info sheet that ships
with my medication reads, "The specific interferon-induced proteins
and mechanisms by which interferon beta-1a exerts it effects in
multiple sclerosis have not been fully defined." On average, it slows
clinical progression (number of lesions in the nervous system) by
about 30%, but MS and its treatments are ellusive. It could be very
mild or very aggressive, and various medications can be very effective
or completely ineffective for different people with MS.
Other possible treatments under investigation include cladribine,
fingolimod, BG00012, MN-166, SB-683699, teriflunomide, atorvastatin
calcium, BHT-3009-01, CNTO 1275, daclizumab, rituximab, Estriol,
ABT-874, Cyclophosphamide, methylprednisolone, MBP8298, Fampridine-SR,
Lamotrigine, tetrahydrocannabinol, and so on. MS is a really hard
problem, and scientists are hitting it from all kinds of different
directions. MS requires several cures. We need to figure out what gets
it to start in the first place and to prevent it from happening at
all. We need to stop the disease in its tracks for those who have
already developed it. Finally, we need to repair the damage that has
been done to the nervous system.
This new vaccine is good news, but people with MS have learned to curb
their enthusiasm whenever new research discoveries are made. All too
often, promising new treatments turn out to have life-threatening side
effects (messing with how your immune system does its job in your
brain is tricky business).
Re:Always a possibility (Score:3, Informative)
No, it's a moot point [wsu.edu].
-Ted
Re:MS anecdonte (Score:3, Informative)
It generally refers to gene regulation via mechanisms beyond DNA sequence. A good example of this is what is called "x chromosome silencing" in all women. While women have two equivalent X chromosomes, one is "permanently silenced" during very early development. This ensures that all of the woman's cells will read X chromosome genes from the same chromosome. No pattern for this has been demonstrated, to the best of my knowledge (as far as favoring paternal vs maternal or anything of that nature).
A more complicated epigenetic mechanism is via the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histone_code/ [wikipedia.org]. While the code itself is still very much under investigation, it has shown many important traits in gene expression as time and conditions vary for an organism.