The role of heat shock proteins in pathogenesis of leukaemia, graft versus host disease, juvenile idiopathic and rheumatoid arthritis"

The aims of the study: Heat shock proteins (Hsps) represent major immunodominant antigens in a wide spectrum of microbial pathogens and immune reactivity against different members of HSP families accompanies many infectious diseases. Known role of Hsps in antigen resentation could also suggest their potential role in the alloreactive process that leads to acute graft versus host disease (GvHD). sequence homology and cross-reactivity between microbial and human Hsps led to the concept that Hsps might be involved in the atiopathogenesis of autoimmune diseases such as juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The major groups of molecular chaperones have been implicated in cancer development as well and stress-inducible Hsp70 was found to be present on the plasma membrane of tumour cells but not on the corresponding normal tissues. On the basis of previous observations we focused our study on the role of Hsps, namely Hsp60 and Hsp70, in the pathogenesis of leukaemia, graft versus host disease, juvenil idiopathic arthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org