Researchers signpost potential MS strategy

In their study appearing in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Giuseppe Matarese and colleagues from Universita di Napoli suggest that leptin neutralization may be a potential way to both prevent and treat human multiple sclerosis (MS).

They found that leptin blockade by the use of either anti-leptin antibodies or a form of the leptin receptor unable to bind leptin, either before or after disease onset, improved clinical symptoms of the disease. The data also confirmed a slowed disease progression, a reduction in disease relapse and a reduced number of antigen-specific T cells.

MS is an inflammatory disease of the brain and spinal chord characterized by muscle weakness, numbness, and loss of coordination. These symptoms result in part from destruction of the nerve-insulating material myelin by activated T cells.

Leptin is known to play a critical role in the regulation of food intake, metabolism, and the immune response. Since it had been previously shown that leptin is expressed in active inflammatory lesions of the central nervous system during MS, Matarese and colleagues investigated the effects of leptin blockade on the induction and progression of the disease in mice.