Autoantibodies refer to antibodies that target self-antigens, which can play pivotal roles in maintaining homeostasis, distinguishing normal from tumor tissue and trigger autoimmune diseases. In the last three decades, tremendous efforts have been devoted to elucidate the generation, evolution and functions of autoantibodies, as well as their target autoantigens. However, reports of these count...

Anti-Golgi complex autoantibodies are found primarily in patients with Sjögren's syndrome and systemic lupus erythematosus, although they are not restricted to these diseases. Several Golgi autoantigens have been identified that represent a small family of proteins. Common features of all Golgi autoantigens appear to be their distinct structural organization of multiple alpha-helical coiled-coi...

Autoimmune diseases are a heterogeneous group of diseases characterized by immune reactions against either a major or a limited number of the bodies own autoantigens, causing inflammation and damage to tissues and organs. Thus, identification of autoantigens is an important first step to understanding autoimmune diseases. Here we demonstrate a simple screening method for identification of autoa...

The immune system struggles every day between responding to foreign antigens and tolerating self-antigens to delicately maintain tissue homeostasis. If self-tolerance is broken, the development of autoimmunity can be the consequence, as it is in the case of the chronic inflammatory autoimmune disease systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). SLE is considered to be a multifactorial disease comprising...

Many intracellular proteins and nucleic acids, that are involved in important biosynthetic pathways, are targeted by autoantibodies occurring spontaneously in the sera of patients with systemic autoimmune diseases. Frequently, the autoantigens are assembled into multicomponent complexes containing both nucleic acid(s) and proteins. Recently, progress has been made in the study of autoantigenic ...

The adjuvant action of various lipopolysaccharides on immune responses to syngeneic tissue extract in mice was examined. Only lipopolysaccharides possessing the linear mannose homopolysaccharides as 0-specific polysaccharides exhibited definite adjuvant action on immune responses to the autoantigens. The intensity of this adjuvant activity of lipopolysaccharide from Kiebsiefla 03 seemed to be t...

The paradigm for pathogenic autoimmunity is the generation of high-titre, affinity-matured autoantibodies to a restricted family of autoantigens, in the appropriate genetic context. Genetic determinants of autoimmunity are largely found within the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) and the 'genotype to serotype to phenotype' concept is supported in a number of autoimmune diseases, where bot...