Cutting Edge Issues in Autoimmunity

Abstract

It is now 25 years since the first publication of Clinical Reviews in Allergy and Immunology. It is fitting that this issue contain a series of cutting-edge papers which reflect a variety of issues in autoimmunity, including mechanisms to modulate new diagnostic techniques, genetic predisposition and environmental influences. Over the past 2 years the major focus of the journal has been on allergic disease and we note a number of these papers (1–29, 30–53, 54–81). In contrast, this issue attempts to include more of an autoimmune bias and the issues are clearly more interesting at the research bench than in the clinic. There have been a number of recent publications that have focused on mechanisms of autoimmunity and these are cited as well (82–116). In this issue, derived in part lies a special symposium of the AESKU-KIPP Institute, a number of the papers discuss the possible role of environmental agents, including adjuvants and infections (117, 118). There is also now the understanding that there may be a predictive significance of autoantibodies (119). There is also a discussion of the T-cell component to autoimmunity, including and especially T regulatory cells (120, 121). Systemic lupus erythematosus continually attracts attention as well as its relationship to vasculitis (122–128). Finally, we note interesting data on the role of skewed X chromosomes in autoimmunity and including scleroderma, as well as a unique perspective of the ontogeny of autoimmunity (129–131).