PMID: 11324691Apr 28, 2001Paper

The self-directed T cell repertoire: its creation and activation

Reviews in Immunogenetics
K D Moudgil, E Sercarz

Abstract

The considerable breadth of the self-directed T cell repertoire has only fully been appreciated during this past decade. It is a potential repertoire which can be tapped in various ways, most evidently in the study of autoimmune diseases, when because of a variety of factors, there is enhanced processing and presentation of determinants on self antigens. In this review, we have focused on the engagement of this self-reactive repertoire and some of the rules involved, which are not always so obvious. The total "residual" self-reactive repertoire directed against a single antigen (that remains after negative selection) will be a heterogeneous assemblage of T cells - (a) high affinity T cells directed against determinants whose presentation during tolerance induction was prevented, eg. through competitive binding by neighboring determinants; (b) lower affinity T cells directed against well-presented (dominant), as well as poorly-presented (cryptic) determinants; and (c) high affinity T cells directed against poorly-presented determinants, which are only presented during inflammation. Under conditions that favor upregulation of previously cryptic self determinants, one or more of the above subsets of the 'protected' T cell repertoi...Continue Reading

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