Publications by authors named "Ann-Sofie Hansson"

Relapsing polychondritis (RP) is an autoimmune disease that affects extra-articular cartilage. Matrilin-1-induced relapsing polychondritis (MIRP) is a model for RP and is useful for studies of the pathogenic mechanisms in this disease. There are indications that the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class II plays a major role in RP, since DR4+ patients are more commonly affected than controls.

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Relapsing polychondritis is an autoimmune disease that affects cartilage in the ear, nose, and respiratory tract. A pathogenic immune response has been proposed and antibodies to several cartilage proteins are detected in sera from these patients. To investigate the role of the humoral immune response in relapsing polychondritis, we used the matrilin-1-induced relapsing polychondritis model.

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UVB light was used to induce an experimental inflammation in normal human skin in order to investigate its correlation with the activity of the newly described enzyme d-dopachrome tautomerase (DDT) in the fluid of experimental blisters. Macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) activity was determined as a closely related marker of inflammation. DDT and MIF activities were demonstrated in blister fluids in all 10 healthy subjects.

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Relapsing polychondritis is an autoimmune disease in which an inappropriate immune response destroys cartilage. Cartilage of the ears, larynx and nose rather than spine and joint cartilage is affected by a chronic relapsing and erosive inflammation. Several animal models for relapsing polychondritis have been published in which immunization with various cartilage proteins induces a variety of chondritis symptoms that mimic those seen in patients.

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The most commonly used animal model for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is collagen-induced arthritis (CIA), induced by immunization with type II collagen (CII), a cartilage restricted protein. In this work we show that type XI collagen (CXI), which is a minor component in cartilage, induces a different form of erosive and chronic relapsing polyarthritis in rats. Using a series of inbred rat strains involving various genetic backgrounds (DA, LEW, E3), and congenic MHC regions (a, u, f, n, c, d), we found that CXI induced arthritis (C(XI)IA) is associated with the RT1f haplotype in contrast to CII induced arthritis (C(II)IA), which is associated with the RT1a and RT1u haplotypes.

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