The follicular dendritic cell: At the germinal center of autoimmunity?

Luc can be very proud that an adaptation of his master thesis has been accepted as a review in Cell Reports! We couldn’t have done this without the help of Søren Degn at Aarhus University. It was a great and enjoyable collaboration in which we all learned something from each other, team effort as it should be!

The review focusses on the (potential) role of Follicular Dendritic Cells (FDC) in autoimmune disease.

Autoimmune diseases strain health care systems worldwide as their incidence is rising and current treatments put patients at risk for infections. An increased understanding of autoimmune diseases is required to develop targeted therapies that do not impair normal immune function. Many autoimmune diseases present with autoantibodies, which drive local or systemic inflammation. This indicates the presence of autoreactive B cells which have escaped tolerance. An important step in the development of autoreactive B cells is the germinal center (GC) reaction, where they undergo affinity maturation towards cognate self-antigen. Follicular dendritic cells (FDCs) perform the essential task of antigen presentation to B cells during the affinity maturation process. However, in recent years, it has become clear that FDCs play a much more active role in regulation of GC processes. Here we evaluate the biology of FDCs in the context of autoimmune disease, with the goal of informing future therapeutic strategies.

More research is needed, but we hope this review is food for thought and a springboard for new research lines on the role(s) of FDCs in autoimmunity.