Disable Arthritis

A new way of treating rheumatoid arthritis has been found

Svetlana Maslova, Hi-tech+

Experiments have shown that exposure to just one protein can slow down and even cure rheumatoid arthritis. Probably, the same approach will work for other incurable inflammatory diseases, scientists say.

Article by Haque et al. Guanylate Binding Protein 5 (GBP5) regulates synovial fibroblast mediated inflammation and tissue destruction in rheumatoid arthritis published in the journal Arthritis & Rheumatology – VM.

For the first time , scientists from Washington State University drew attention to the GBP5 protein back in 2015, when they analyzed the expression of various genes in the joint tissue of patients with rheumatoid arthritis and in healthy people. GBP5 stood out among thousands of genes with too high a level of expression, so scientists began to study its role in the development of rheumatoid arthritis and other autoimmune diseases.

It is known that inflammation in rheumatoid arthritis is primarily caused by the protein interleukin-1 beta (IL-1b). Scientists began to observe what would happen to the synovial fibroblasts surrounding the joints if GBP5 was blocked, and then IL-1b was added to them to activate inflammation. It turned out that the level of inflammation was much higher in cells without GBP5. Moreover, if scientists increased the level of GBP5 in them, it reduced the inflammation caused by IL-1b.

Initially, researchers thought that GBP5 plays a key role in the occurrence of inflammation, however, after studying the entire mechanism in detail, it turned out that the protein is activated in response to inflammation.

Then they found out that GBP5 also interacts with gamma interferon, which under certain circumstances fights inflammation. Thus, when GBP5 was blocked, the ability of gamma interferon to reduce the level of inflammation was significantly lower. This means that in addition to its own anti-inflammatory properties, GBP5 also supports the anti-inflammatory function of gamma interferon, the scientists concluded.

In experiments with mice, GBP5 blocking also led to joint inflammation and bone loss.

Currently, the team intends to confirm the effect of experimental therapy on models of larger animals before testing the treatment in patients with rheumatoid arthritis. For now, they plan to develop tools to increase GBP5 levels in order to reduce inflammation and bone loss against the background of disease progression.

In the future, the researchers will also test the approach at the earliest stages of rheumatoid arthritis to find out whether the treatment can reverse and completely cope with the disease. It is very likely that the new treatment strategy will also be effective for other inflammatory diseases, including gout and osteoarthritis.

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