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. 2018 Mar 14;9:462. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2018.00462

Table 3.

HERV-W/MSRV-derived Env proteins investigated in human autoimmune diseases.

Disorder Main symptoms Possible Env-related effects References
Multiple Sclerosis Progressive demyelination of central nervous system, axon damage, alterations in both innate and adaptive immunity, neuroinflammation Abundant expression in brain lesions and cells involved in neuroinflammation, superAg activity, potent stimulation of TLR4 and massive production of proinflammatory cytokines responsible for astrocyte and oligodendrocyte damage/death and MS-like disease in mouse models Perron et al., 2001, 2013; Antony et al., 2004; Rolland et al., 2005, 2006; Mameli et al., 2007b; Saresella et al., 2009; Madeira et al., 2016
TLR4-mediated induction of nitric oxide synthase, formation of nitrotyrosine groups blocking oligodendrocyte differentiation and affecting myelin expression Kremer et al., 2013
Onset of specific humoral response, potential molecular mimicry with myelin protein and Ab cross-reactivity Brudek et al., 2009; Do Olival et al., 2013; Mameli et al., 2015; Ramasamy et al., 2017
CIDP Demyelination of peripheral nervous system roots, chronic inflammation Stimulation of Schwann cells IL-6 and CXCL10 chemokine production, cell-cell fusion, increased cell proliferation, transformation, migration and invasion Faucard et al., 2016
type 1 diabetes Immune reactions against pancreatic β cells, deficiency in insulin production Inhibition of insulin secretion by Langerhans islets β cells, stimulation of pancreatic immune-cell infiltrates Levet et al., 2017