Immunotherapy by peptides?
Article Abstract:
Autoimmune diseases share a common characteristic; the body attacks a substance that is naturally present and should not be attacked. The substance that stimulates this response by the immune system is called an antigen. When the immune system recognizes the natural substance as an antigen, it produces antibodies to attempt to destroy the antigen, and thus potentially destroys the body's own tissues. The cells of the immune system that react to antigens are called T lymphocytes, or T cells, and are a special type of white blood cell. Antigens contains a peptide (protein fragment) which activates the T cells, initiating their attack. One way of treating autoimmune disease is to introduce a substitute peptide that competes with the antigen peptide, thereby cancelling the message that tells the T cells to destroy the antigen. A different use of peptides in therapy for autoimmune disease is to provide a peptide similar in structure to the part of the T cell that reacts to the antigen, the receptor. The goal of this approach is to immunize the individual against the autoimmune response; the method is to provide synthetic T cell receptor peptides as a vaccine. The key region of the T cell, the receptor, appears to be similar in structure for several of the different autoimmune diseases. One such disease, experimental allergic encephalomyelitis (inflammation of the brain and spinal cord), is being studied in rats as an experimental model for rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis and autoimmune diabetes. Of the two therapies, both of which use peptides, the vaccine using T cell receptors would be preferable since only one injection of vaccine would be needed to treat the disease. The other approach, which provides a substitute for the antigen peptide, would require continuous treatment. Either type of peptide therapy will require much time and effort to develop; genetic engineering techniques will be involved in the research.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1989
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Forebrain peptides modulate sexually polymorphic vocal circuitry
Article Abstract:
Intrasexual behavioural divergence is connected with variability in arginine-vasotocin and isotocin function. This divergence in function between males is linked with one male phenotype expressing a profile of neuropeptide function typical of conspecific males. This research, carried out on the plainfin midshipman fish, has produced neurophysiological evidence that males with vocal characteristics typical of females have the same pattern of neuropeptide function as females. Sex differences in the potency of both arginine-vasopressin and oxytocin homologues have been seen to exist in a non-mammalian vertebrate.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 2000
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Short alanine-based peptides may form 3-10-helices and not alpha-helices in aqueous solution
Article Abstract:
Alanine-based peptides with 16 or 17 residues have a 3-10-helical geometrical structure rather than an alpha-helical structure. This was determined using circular dichroism, Fourier-transform infrared and electron-spin resonance spectra, a technique that overcame the limitations of existing spectroscopic methods. The infrared absorbance yielded an amide I band with a frequency unlike what is typical for alpha-helices, while the ranking of distances between side chains obtained by the electron-spin resonance was likewise incompatible with an alpha-helical structure.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1992
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