Israeli scientists have outwitted the immune system.
Autoimmune diseases can be called ... The spectrum of these disorders is very broad - from the popular lupus to rheumatoid arthritis. But the means of treatment is more complicated: the most usual way - suppression of the immune system.
If we continue the analogy with conventional madness, then we can say that the patient simply humble and isolated, reducing its dangerous activity, but does not cure. And recently, a group of Israeli scientists Prof. Irit Sagi (Irit Sagi) was ...
The object of their research was the protein matrix metallopeptidaza 9 (MMP9), involved in the formation and maintenance of the extracellular matrix - tissue structures that serve as a skeleton on which the developing cells. This provides a matrix, and transport of various chemicals - from nutritional to the signaling molecules. It stimulates growth and cell proliferation at the site of damage. But the shaping of its proteins, and, above all MMR9, going out of control of their inhibitory activity of proteins - endogenous inhibitors of metalloproteinases (TIMPS), may become a cause of some autoimmune disorders.
The researchers took up the question of how it is possible to ... So far in solving this problem, researchers have focused on finding chemical agents that selectively block the work of MMPS. However, this approach has serious limitations and serious side effects - of a group of biologists and Irit Sagi decided to approach the problem from a different angle. They decided to synthesize a molecule which, when introduced into the body, would stimulate the immune system to produce antibodies that are similar to proteins TIMPS. This much more subtle approach provides the highest accuracy antibodies will attack the MMPS many orders of magnitude more selective and more effective than any chemical compound.
And scientists have succeeded: they synthesized a synthetic analogue of the active site of protein MMPS9: zinc ion, coordinated by three histidine residues. His injection of laboratory mice resulted in the production of antibodies, acting in exactly the same manner in which proteins work TIMPS: blocking the entrance to the active site.
