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Updated: Jul 9, 2026

Interrogating Individual Autoreactive Germinal Centers by Photoactivation in a Mixed Chimeric Model of Autoimmunity
Published on: April 11, 2019
Autoreactive B cells get activated in extrafollicular sites
Florian Weisel1, Ute Wellmann, Thomas H Winkler
1Hematopoiesis Unit, Institute for Biology, Nikolaus-Fiebiger-Center for Molecular Medicine, University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany.
Abstract:
Autoreactive B cells are prevented from producing autoantibodies that may cause pathogenicity in autoimmune diseases by the induction of tolerance. When autoreactive B cells escape regulation in autoimmune-prone individuals, large amounts of autoantibodies are produced with somatic mutations in their variable regions. In this issue of the European Journal of Immunology, a new and very useful model is presented that induces activation and hypermutation of autoreactive B cells upon injection of chromatin-containing immune complexes. The differentiation and hypermutation of autoreactive B cells takes place at extrafollicular sites.
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