doi:10.1155/2012/640835 Clinical Study Ileal Inflammation May Trigger the Development of GP2-Specific Pancreatic Autoantibodies in Patients with Crohn’s Disease

Copyright © 2012 Polychronis Pavlidis et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Why zymogen glycoprotein 2 (GP2), the Crohn’s disease (CD)-specific pancreatic autoantigen, is the major target of humoral autoimmunity in inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) is uknown. Recent evidence demonstrates that GP2 is also present on the apical surface of microfold (M) intestinal cells. As the colon lacks GP2-rich M cells, we assumed that patients with colonic CD are seronegative for anti-GP2. Anti-GP2 antibodies were tested in 225 CDs, including 45 patients with colonic location (L2), 45 with terminal ileum (L1) and 135 with ileocolonic involvement; 225 patients with ulcerative colitis (UC) were also tested. Anti-GP2 reactivity was detected in 59 (26.2%) CDs and 15 (6.7%) UCs (P < 0.001). Only 5 CDs with L2 had anti-GP2 antibodies