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Researchers Funded By The National MS Society “Turn Off” MS-Like Immune Attacks in Mice, Without Suppressing Needed Immune Defenses

September 14, 2016

A team from the University of Maryland reported on a novel strategy for stopping the immune attack in MS in the future, without suppressing the entire immune system. In lab studies, the team injected designed particles that delivered regulatory immune signals directly into lymph nodes – the tissues that control immune function. A single dose, delivered at the peak of MS-like disease in mice, was able to reverse symptoms, and appeared to affect only the immune functions involved with the disease.

“This innovative research has the potential to open up a new, highly selective approach to treating multiple sclerosis,” said Bruce F. Bebo, Ph.D., Executive Vice President of Research at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. “We are pleased to have helped launch this work with early pilot and full research grants, and hope that the further research required to translate these results to people is equally successful.”

Read more in a news story from the University of Maryland
Read the study in Cell Reports
Learn more about research to stop the immune attack in MS

About Multiple Sclerosis

Multiple sclerosis is an unpredictable, often disabling disease of the central nervous system that disrupts the flow of information within the brain, and between the brain and body. Symptoms range from numbness and tingling to blindness and paralysis. The progress, severity and specific symptoms of MS in any one person cannot yet be predicted, but advances in research and treatment are leading to better understanding and moving us closer to a world free of MS. Most people with MS are diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 50, with at least two to three times more women than men being diagnosed with the disease. MS affects more than 2.3 million people worldwide.

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