B. Gran et al., DETECTION OF SKEWED T-CELL RECEPTOR V-BETA GENE USAGE IN THE PERIPHERAL-BLOOD OF PATIENTS WITH MULTIPLE-SCLEROSIS, Journal of neuroimmunology, 85(1), 1998, pp. 22-32
The ex vivo analysis of the T-cell receptor V-beta (TCRBV) gene usage
by circulating T lymphocytes in Multiple Sclerosis (MS) patients may c
ontribute to understanding disease pathogenesis. In the present study,
TCRBV gene usage was analyzed in freshly collected unstimulated perip
heral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) isolated from 40 MS patients and
20 healthy controls. Nine patients presented abnormal repertoires, wit
h expansion of one or more TCRBV segments. Among these patients, six p
resented expansion of TCRBV9 chain expression, three also having an ex
pansion of TCRBV1, TCRBV11 and TCRBV22 segments. The most frequently o
bserved TCRBV chain expansion, TCRBV9, was further analyzed and identi
fied as polyclonal. Evaluation of clinical variables showed that media
n disease duration was shorter in patients with TCRBV gene expression
abnormalities. Longitudinal evaluation of five patients with a skewed
repertoire showed regression of expanded TCRBV chains expression to no
rmal values. These data indicate that certain MS patients have abnorma
l TCRBV gene expression. Such abnormalities are caused by polyclonal e
xpansions of T lymphocyte subpopulations that use the same TCRBV gene
families, are unstable and preferentially observed early in the course
of the disease. (C) 1398 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.