Volume 9 Issue 6, June 2009

Our understanding of the role of T cells in the induction of autoimmune disease in the central nervous system has progressed rapidly in recent years. Here, Joan Goverman provides us with a comprehensive overview of this field and discusses the controversies that remain.

With recent studies revealing the genetic determinants of multiple sclerosis, our attention must now turn to defining the function of the candidate genes in disease pathogenesis. This Review describes our progress so far and the approaches required to tease out the contribution made by multiple genetic and environmental factors.

Work in the past decade has revealed the role of neural circuits in modulating inflammatory conditions. Here, Kevin Tracey discusses the inflammatory reflex, and in particular the efferent arc of this reflex, which is known as the cholinergic anti-inflammatory pathway. In this pathway, acetylcholine activity suppresses the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines.

In this Review article, Serge Rivest discusses how microglial cells (the resident innate immune cells of the central nervous system) are activated during infection and injury, whether microglial cell activation is neurodestructive or neuroprotective, and how targeting these cells could be a therapeutic approach for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease.

The relapsing-remitting form of multiple sclerosis affects around two thirds of patients with this disease. This Review discusses the roles of three key molecules — α4β1 integrin, its binding partner osteopontin and the chaperone protein αB crystallin — in the biology of relapse and remission.

In this Opinion article, Betty Diamond and colleagues propose that common serum antibodies that crossreact with brain antigens might be responsible for many acquired changes or congenital impairments in cognition and behaviour in the absence of overt brain inflammation.

Recent research in the area of neuroimmunology has focused on the role of immune cells, such as autoimmune T cells and microglial cells, in the initiation and progression of particular neurological diseases, such as multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer's disease. In addition, there have been important advances in our understanding of the effects of an inflammatory response in the brain owing to infection or injury. This Focus highlights these recent advances and their therapeutic implications.