OBJECTIVE To determine the prevalence of ankylosing spondylitis in the Fula ethnic group in The Gambia, and relate the disease prevalence to the B27 frequency and subtype distribution of that population. METHODS 215 first degree relatives of 48 B27 positive Fula twin pairs, and 900 adult Fula males were screened for ankylosing spondylitis by clinical and, where appropriate, radiographic means...

To test the hypothesis that HLA-B27 predisposes to disease by forming disulfide-linked homodimers, we examined rats transgenic for HLA-B27, mutant Cys(67)Ser HLA-B27, or HLA-B7. In splenic Con A blasts from high transgene copy B27 lines that develop inflammatory disease, the anti-H chain mAb HC10 precipitated four bands of molecular mass 78-105 kDa and additional higher molecular mass material,...

HLA-B27 transgenic animal models suggest a role for CD4(+) T lymphocytes in the pathogenesis of the spondyloarthropathies, and murine studies have raised the possibility that unusual forms of B27 may be involved in disease. We demonstrate that CD4(+) T cells capable of recognizing B27 can be isolated from humans by coculture with the MHC class II-negative cell line T2 transfected with B27. Thes...

Twenty three anti-Klebsiella antisera were tested for their cytotoxic activity and four for their binding capacity for peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) from patients with HLA-B27 positive ankylosing spondylitis (AS+B27+) and from B27 positive (AS-B27+) and B27 negative (AS-B27-) healthy individuals. None of the antisera showed specific activity against PBL from any particular group. The antis...

Human class I major histocompatibility complex allele HLA-B27 is associated with a group of human diseases called "spondyloarthropathies." Studies on transgenic rats expressing HLA-B27 and human beta 2-microglobulin have confirmed the role of HLA-B27 in disease pathogenesis. Here we report spontaneous inflammatory arthritis in HLA-B27 transgenic mice lacking beta 2-microglobulin (B27+ beta 2m-/...

H u m a n class I major histocompatibility complex allele HLA-B27 is associated with a group of human diseases called "spondyloarthropathies." Studies on transgenic rats expressing HLA-B27 and human 132-microglobulin have confirmed the role of HLA-B27 in disease pathogenesis. Here we report spontaneous inflammatory arthritis in HLA-B27 transgenic mice lacking 132microglobulin (B27+132m-/-). In ...

Clinical features and prognosis of HLA-B27 positive anterior uveitis (AU) were assessed compared with HLA-B27 negative AU in a Korean population, based on the medical records of AU patients seen at a university hospital. Twenty-seven HLA-B27 negative, idiopathic AU patients (group I) and 55 HLA-B27 positive AU patients (group II) were studied. HLA-B27 positive group was further divided into 29 ...

OBJECTIVES Human leukocyte antigen (HLA)-B27 (B27) is the strongest genetic factor associated with development of Ankylosing Spondylitis and other spondyloarthropathies (SpA), yet the role it plays in disease pathogenesis remains unclear. We investigated the expression of potentially pathogenic non-conventional heavy chain forms (NC) of B27 in synovial and intestinal tissues obtained from SpA p...

Human histocompatibility leukocyte antigen B27 is highly associated with the rheumatic diseases termed spondyloarthropathies, but the mechanism is not known. B27 transgenic rats develop a spontaneous disease resembling the human spondyloarthropathies that includes arthritis and colitis. To investigate whether this disease requires the binding of specific peptides to B27, we made a minigene cons...

The development of suitable methods to deliver peptides specifically to the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) can provide some potential therapeutic applications of such peptides. Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is strongly associated with the expression of human leukocytic antigen-B27 (HLA-B27). HLA-B27 heavy chain (HC) has a propensity to fold slowly resulting in the accumulation of misfolded HLA-B27 HC...