Experimental autoimmune uveitis: molecular mimicry and oral tolerance

Intraocular inflammatory disease or uveitis, which affects the uveal tract and the retina of the eyes in human, is the major cause of visual impairment. Experimental autoimmune uveitis (EAU) is a T-cell-mediated autoimmune disease directed against retinal proteins and has been studied in several mammalian species including subhuman primates as a model for human posterior uveitis. Autoimmune responses provoked by molecular mimicry occur when the nonself and host determinants are similar enough to cross-react yet different enough to break immunological tolerance, and is one of the proposed mechanisms for induction of autoimmune diseases. Therapeutic immunomodulatory strategies have been used to induce antigen-specific peripheral immune tolerance in animal models of T-cell-mediated autoimmune diseases by oral administration of autoantigens. Oral tolerance leads to unique mechanisms of tissue and disease-specific immunosuppression, which would circumvent the immunotherapeutic problem of multiple target tissue autoreactivity. Several groups have investigated the effects of delivering autoantigens across gastric mucosal surfaces. This review briefly discusses molecular mimicry and the mechanism of induction of oral tolerance with respect to immunopathogenesis of T-cell-mediated autoimmune disease in general and EAU in particular.