RNPs and autoimmunity: 20 years later
- Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510, USA
- Corresponding author: sandra.wolin{at}yale.edu
This extract was created in the absence of an abstract.
In response to Tim's invitation to reflect on a significant advance in the RNA field, I chose a “bedside to bench and back again” story that has now revealed the centrality of autoantibodies and their RNP targets in the development of autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus. Because this story may not be well known to some readers of RNA, I recount it in some detail below.
Back in 1995, the use of antibodies from patients suffering from systemic lupus erythematosus to discover spliceosomal snRNPs and other ribonucleoprotein particles was a classic “bedside to bench” story. Beginning with the 1966 report of the “Sm” autoantigen, several immunologists and rheumatologists, including Henry Kunkel, Eng Tan, and Morris Reichlin, remarkably discovered that patients with systemic lupus erythematosus produced antibodies against their own cellular antigens. The initial characterization revealed that one antigen (called “RNP”) was a ribonucleoprotein that was physically associated …
