Does adoptive transfer of IL-4 expressing T cells reduce the severity of EAE in myelin basic protein-immunized mice?
T lymphocytes transduced with retroviral vectors can deliver regulatory cytokines site-specifically, representing a potential therapeutic strategy for autoimmune diseases.
Experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) is an inflammatory autoimmune disease of the central nervous system which serves as a model for the human disease multiple sclerosis. We demonstrate here that encephalitogenic T cells, transduced with a retroviral gene, construct to express interleukin 4, and can delay the onset and reduce the severity of EAE when adoptively transferred to myelin basic protein-immunized mice. Thus, T lymphocytes transduced with retroviral vectors can deliver "regulatory cytokines" in a site-specific manner and may represent a viable therapeutic strategy for the treatment of autoimmune disease.
Shaw et al. (Mon,) studied this question.