Vitamin D, a Monkey Wrench in the MS Biochemical Machinery

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Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common cause of acquired disability in adults. It typically affects people between the ages of 20 and 50, but it can strike at any age. It affects two to three times as many women as men and is more common among people with northern European ancestry. Approximately 400,000 Americans and as many as 2.5 million people worldwide have MS (National Multiple Sclerosis Society). There is no cure for MS. Although interleukin 17 (IL17) mediates and vitamin D mitigates its pathogenesis, the biochemical mechanisms by which they do so were relatively unknown - until recently. A research team led by co-principal investigators Dr. Sylvia Christakos at New Jersey Medical School and Dr. Lawrence Steinman at Stanford University has provided new insight on how vitamin D interferes with the complex MS biochemical pathways (Joshi et al. 2011). As a result of their findings, novel MS therapies may be on the horizon.

Read the rest of the article here: http://jaxmice.jax.org/news/2011/MS_vitD.html