Activation antigens in patients with Sjögren's syndrome.

We report findings of a study of two receptors on mononuclear cells from patients with Sjögren's syndrome (SS). The two receptors, interleukin-2 receptor (IL-2), transferrin receptor (TfR), were identified using monoclonal antibodies anti-IL-2 and OKT9. We found that the IL-2 and TfR positive cells were significantly higher on mononuclear cells (MC) from peripheral blood (PB) of patients with SS than in healthy controls. The study revealed that the IL-2 and TfR positivity reflects systemic immune activation and correlates closely with the activity of SS.