Arthritis Study Suggests New Link
In a finding that could lead to new treatments for arthritis, U.S. researchers said last week that naturally occurring carbohydrates may be the elusive cause of the illness.
The carbohydrates, known as glycosaminoglycans, or GAGS, appear to activate cells that are part of the body’s immune system, causing the painful inflammation that afflicts hundreds of millions of people around the world, they said.
“This study shows that rheumatoid arthritis may result from the body’s mishandling of its own carbohydrates that, under normal circumstances, would not be interpreted as a threat,” said Julia Wang, the study’s lead researcher.
Wang, who presented her research at the national meeting of the American Chemical Society, said her finding has come under heavy attack because it challenged the conventional thinking that peptides--little pieces of protein--are responsible for auto-immune diseases such as arthritis.
“The concept that carbohydrates can be responsible for auto-immune diseases is completely new,” she told Reuters. “People simply don’t want to recognize it. They’ve been taught peptides are responsible, which is understood.”
Although there have been promising advances in treating the symptoms of arthritis, its causes have remained a mystery.
“The problem is that people have been trying to search to understand arthritis by sticking to the old dogma, but that hasn’t solved the problem,” said Wang, a researcher at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and a professor at Harvard Medical School.
The new research marked the first time glycosaminoglycans, a major component of joint cartilage, joint fluid, connective tissue and skin, have been associated with the condition.
Wang said she and her colleague Michael Roehrl studied the effects glycosaminoglycans had on mice, which subsequently experienced arthritic symptoms including swelling, inflammation and joint damage. She also looked at human tissue taken from arthritis patients and found the same type of cells that bind to GAGs.
Wang said subsequent research would most likely focus on developing drugs aimed at stopping the growth, expansion or adhesion of immune cells that react to GAGs.
John Mekalanos, professor and chairman of microbiology and molecular genetics at Harvard Medical School, said the research is very promising. “We are clearly a step closer to understanding the causes of a disease that has left the medical community with unanswered questions and many patients with discomfort and pain,” he said in a statement.
