Assessment of the occupational relevance of allergens based on their molecular structure, metabolism and cross reactivity to related chemical compounds

• Research unit: EU RFP
• Project number: 97.0431

Key words (English)

Occupational allergens; drug allergy; cross reactivity; sulfonamides; T cell immunity

Alternative project number (English)

EU project number: BMH4CT983713

Research programs (English)

EU-programme: 4. Frame Research Programme - 4.2 Agriculture and agroindustry

Short description (English)

See abstract

Further information (English)

Full name of research-institution/enterprise:
Inselspital Bern
Institut für Immunologie und Allergologie

Partners and International Organizations (English)

Coordinator: Universitätsklinikum Aachen (D)

Abstract (English)

We recently established a model, that drug stimulation may also occur with drugs unable to bind in a covalent way to MHC peptide complexes. We demonstrated that chemically inert drugs are able to stimulate preactivated T cell clones and recently we found, that most likely also resting T cells are activated by non-covalently binding drugs. This implies, that drugs can be used as substances interacting with a specific T cell receptor and opens completely new ways in future therapeutic intervention in autoimmune or allergic diseases!
We analysed in detail the crossreactivity of such drug-stimulated T cells: We found, that drug stimulated T cells can interact with different, structurally related drugs, which require, however, a certain homology in the overall structure). The existence of a sulfonamide bridge within the drug is not sufficient to cause cross-reactivity . This has important implications for future therapies, as it is i.e. recommended that sulfomanide-containing drugs (like celecoxib, furosemide etc.) are avoided in persons sensitized to sulfonamide-antibiotics (i.e. Bactrimâ). This precaution appears to be unnecessary, if T cell reactions were relevant for the drug allergy. In addition, we found that drug-stimulated T cells react to a high degree with autologus structures . This has implications for drug induced autoimmunity .

References in databases (English)

Swiss Database: Euro-DB of the
State Secretariat for Education and Research
Hallwylstrasse 4
CH-3003 Berne, Switzerland
Tel. [phone]
Swiss Project-Number: 97.0431