MONOZYGOTIC TWINS CONCORDANTLY AFFECTED BY PSORIASIS EXHIBIT A SIMILAR SHIFT IN THE T-CELL RECEPTOR V-BETA-REPERTOIRE OF LESIONAL COMPARED TO CIRCULATING LYMPHOCYTES

Recent studies concerning the possible involvement of (super-) antigen s in the pathogenesis of psoriasis have been hampered by 1) difficulti es in accounting for the influence of different HLA backgrounds and 2) lack of (semi-) quantitative analysis of the complete receptor-repert oire in lesional lymphocytes. We therefore compared the T-cell recepto r V beta-repertoire in blood and skin of two monozygotic twin pairs co ncordantly affected by psoriasis by means of a semiquantitative polyme rase chain reaction. The twin pairs showed parallel shifts in the lesi onal receptor-repertoire with regard to some, but not all, variable re gions. These shifts differed between the twin pairs studied and might be triggered by antigens rather than superantigens. The novel polymera se chain reaction technique employed allows for adequate compensation of amplification efficiency for different variable reqion families and therefore represents valuable progress in the technology applied in T -cell receptor-repertoire analysis in general.