[HN Gopher] "Inverse vaccine" shows potential to treat MS and ot...
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"Inverse vaccine" shows potential to treat MS and other autoimmune
diseases
Author : manicennui
Score : 32 points
Date : 2023-09-15 20:39 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (pme.uchicago.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (pme.uchicago.edu)
| tomohawk wrote:
| > The new "inverse vaccine" does just the opposite: it removes
| the immune system's memory of one molecule
|
| Very cool, but what would happen if that molecule was small pox?
| dogsgobork wrote:
| Since smallpox was eradicated over 40 years ago and most people
| alive today have not been vaccinated against it, I doubt it
| would matter much.
| JonathonW wrote:
| The US and Europe haven't vaccinated for smallpox since the
| early '70s and routine vaccination wrapped up globally in the
| mid-'80s, so, for many... absolutely nothing.
| hinkley wrote:
| I used to be amused when period pieces would show actresses
| (particularly European) in sleeveless attire with their
| smallpox vaccine scar, three feet tall in the closeup shots.
|
| Turns out smallpox vaccines are a lot older than I thought.
| They might have not looked exactly like that in Victorian
| England, but an iteration of it did already exist. Guess
| that's why they cover up tattoos but not smallpox scars.
| jiofj wrote:
| I know many people in my country, Spain, who are 60+ and
| have smallpox vaccine scars.
| hinkley wrote:
| Yeah the movies I'm thinking of, those people would be
| 40-60 today, maybe a little bit older.
| gweinberg wrote:
| I used to have a smallpox scar but it eventually faded
| away. I am in my 50s.
| readthenotes1 wrote:
| Good question!
|
| s/small pox/a marker for a harmful agent/
| rendleflag wrote:
| I wonder if this could be used to address allergies as well.
| thenerdhead wrote:
| Anyone have context as to how the name came to be? When I think
| of inverse vaccine, I think of something that gives you a
| disease. This is suggestive of erasing memory instead.
|
| Super exciting work nonetheless.
| pazimzadeh wrote:
| Because immune tolerance is the opposite of immune protection,
| when it comes to the adaptive immune system, whose business is
| deciding what to do the next time it encounters an antigen
| (it's a memory response either way).
|
| But really what they found here should maybe be called an
| inverse vaccine adjuvant (the part of the vaccine which tells
| your immune system that the associated antigen is dangerous,
| and a protective response should be mounted to it)
| manicennui wrote:
| "A typical vaccine teaches the human immune system to recognize a
| virus or bacteria as an enemy that should be attacked. The new
| 'inverse vaccine' does just the opposite: it removes the immune
| system's memory of one molecule. While such immune memory erasure
| would be unwanted for infectious diseases, it can stop autoimmune
| reactions like those seen in multiple sclerosis, type I diabetes,
| or rheumatoid arthritis, in which the immune system attacks a
| person's healthy tissues."
| XorNot wrote:
| Wow. This is a big deal: autoimmune diseases are one of the
| hardest to treat.
|
| The same strategy presumably could be applied for something like
| Crohn's disease. And I guess at a long shot, might work if IBS
| has an autoimmune component.
| malfist wrote:
| Wonder if it could treat arthritis? It like another commenter
| said, allergies.
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