Title:History and Milestones of Mouse Models of Autoimmune Diseases
Volume: 21
Issue: 18
Author(s): Xinhua Yu, Qiaoniang Huang and Frank Petersen
Affiliation:
Keywords:
Mouse models, autoimmune diseases, history, milestones.
Abstract: Autoimmune diseases are a group of disorders mediated by self-reactive T cells and/or autoantibodies.
Mice, as the most widely used animal for modeling autoimmune disorders, have been extensively used in the investigation
of disease pathogenesis as well as in the search for novel therapeutics. Since the first mouse model of
multiple sclerosis was established more than 60 years ago, hundreds of mouse models have been established for
tens of autoimmune diseases. These mouse models can be divided into three categories based on the approaches
used for disease induction. The first one represents the induced models in which autoimmunity is initiated in mice
by immunization, adoptive transfer or environmental factors. The second group is formed by the spontaneous
models where mice develop autoimmune disorders without further induction. The third group refers to the humanized
models in which mice bearing humanized cells, tissues, or genes, develop autoimmune diseases either spontaneously
or by induction. This article reviews the history and highlights the milestones of the mouse models of autoimmune diseases.
