Nagvekar N, Jacobson L W, Willcox N, Vincent A
Neuroscience Group, Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Oxford, UK.
Clin Exp Immunol. 1998 Apr;112(1):17-20. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2249.1998.00556.x.
Most thymic epithelial tumours that associate with MG express an epitope that resembles the sequence alpha373-380 from the cytoplasmic loop of the acetylcholine receptor (AChR). It has been proposed that sensitization to this linear epitope initiates autoimmunity to the AChR in thymoma-associated MG. We therefore tested whether MG/thymoma patients have T cell responses or antibodies to this region of the AChR. We found no significant recognition of the alpha309-417 region by their thymoma or peripheral blood T cells, or by their serum anti-AChR antibodies. Instead, the T cell epitopes that were recognized, like the previously characterized B cell epitopes, were in the extracellular AChR domain.
大多数与重症肌无力相关的胸腺上皮肿瘤表达一种与乙酰胆碱受体（AChR）细胞质环中α373 - 380序列相似的表位。有人提出，对这种线性表位的致敏引发了胸腺瘤相关重症肌无力中针对AChR的自身免疫。因此，我们测试了重症肌无力/胸腺瘤患者是否对AChR的该区域有T细胞反应或抗体。我们发现，他们的胸腺瘤或外周血T细胞以及血清抗AChR抗体对α309 - 417区域均无明显识别。相反，所识别的T细胞表位与先前鉴定的B细胞表位一样，位于AChR的细胞外结构域。
