Anti-IL-17 therapy restricts and reverses late-term corneal allorejection.

Corneal allograft rejection has been described as a Th1-mediated process involving IFN-γ production. However, recent evidence also implicated IL-17 as being involved in acute corneal allograft responses. Our data support that IL-17 is involved in early acute corneal allograft acceptance.

Mice with mutations in Fas and Fas ligand demonstrate increased herpetic stromal keratitis following corneal infection with HSV-1.

HSV-1 infection of the cornea leads to a potentially blinding immunoinflammatory lesion of the cornea, termed herpetic stromal keratitis. It has also been shown that one of the factors limiting inflammation of the cornea is the presence of Fas ligand (FasL) on corneal epithelium and endothelium. In this study, the role played by FasL expression in the cornea following acute infection with HSV-1 was determined.