Autoantibody profiles in the sera of patients with Q fever: characterization of antigens by immunofluorescence, immunoblot and sequence analysis
Recent reports have shown that some of the immunological aspects of Q fever, a rickettsiosis caused by Coxiella burnetii, could be related to self-antigen responses. The aim of this study was to determine the specificity of the autoantibody response of patients with acute and chronic Coxiella infect...
| Autores: | , , , |
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| Tipo de recurso: | artículo |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2005 |
| País: | España |
| Institución: | Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII) |
| Repositorio: | Repisalud |
| Idioma: | inglés |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:repisalud.isciii.es:20.500.12105/6983 |
| Acceso en línea: | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12105/6983 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Autoantibodies Coxiella burnetii Q Fever |
| Sumario: | Recent reports have shown that some of the immunological aspects of Q fever, a rickettsiosis caused by Coxiella burnetii, could be related to self-antigen responses. The aim of this study was to determine the specificity of the autoantibody response of patients with acute and chronic Coxiella infections. Smooth muscle and cardiac muscle-specific autoantibodies were observed in significant percentages in acutely or chronically affected Q fever patients when compared to healthy volunteers. Moreover, the incidence of cardiac muscle-specific autoantibody was significantly higher among chronically ill patients compared to acutely ill patients. Moreover, a band of 50 kD of a HeLa extract was detected in most of the sera of individuals with chronic infections and previous sequence analysis suggests that this antigen presents a high degree of homology with the human actin elongation factor 1 alpha. Further research would be necessary to confirm if antibodies to human cytoskeletal proteins could be of clinical importance in chronically infected Q fever patients. |
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