A clever disguise is all it takes to bring a halt to multiple sclerosis in mice.

In MS, immune cells called T-cells treat myelin – which insulates nerves – as a foreign invader and destroy it. This disrupts nerve cell communication, causing symptoms such as numbness, paralysis and blindness.

Current therapies suppress the whole immune system. To get round this, Daniel Getts of Northwestern University in Chicago and colleagues attached myelin molecules to biodegradable nanoparticles and injected them into the bloodstream of mice with MS.

The nanoparticles are consumed by another type of immune cell – macrophages – that mistake them for harmless dying red blood cells. The team thinks the macrophages then send a message to the rest of the immune system that this particle, along with its myelin accomplice, should be tolerated.


This targeted immune response prevented relapses of MS symptoms for up to 100 days without affecting other immune pathways

Journal reference: Nature Biotechnology, doi.org/jsr