title: The mosaic of environment involvement in autoimmunity: the abrogation of viral latency by stress, a non-infectious environmental agent, is an intrinsic prerequisite prelude before viruses can rank as infectious environmental agents that trigger autoimmune diseases.
abstract: An autoimmune disease (AD), organ-specific or systemic, results from an aberrant response in which the protective immune system normally schooled to recognize and destroy invading infectious agents (viruses, etc.) instead fails to distinguish self-antigens and proceeds to attack and destroy the host's organs. There can be familial aggregation in which a single AD may occur in members of a family, or a single family may be afflicted with multiple ADs. Finally, sometimes multiple ADs co-occur in a single individual: the kaleidoscope of autoimmunity. Autoimmunity is a multifactorial process in which genetic, hormonal, immunological and environmental factors act in concert to materialize the mosaic of autoimmunity phenomenon. A genetically primed individual may yet not develop an AD: the contribution by an environmental factor (non-infectious or infectious) is essential for completion of the act. Of the non-infectious factors, stress plays a determinative step in autoimmunity in that it abrogates viral latency and thereby ordains the viruses to qualify as infectious environmental factors that trigger ADs. This is note-worthy as viruses rank first as the most important environmental triggers of ADs. Furthermore, all these viruses experience going through latency. Hence the hypothesis: "The abrogation of viral latency by stress, a non-infectious environmental agent, is an intrinsic prerequisite prelude before viruses can rank as infectious environmental agents that trigger autoimmune diseases". There is collaboration here between non-infectious- and infectious-agent to achieve the cause of autoimmunity. We say viral latency and stress have a covenant: continued perpetration of autoimmunity is dependent on the intervention by stress to reactivate latent infections.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Endocrinology and Diabetes, The Children's Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, NSW, Australia. Electronic address: temajo@grapevine.net.au.
authors.forename: Norbert O
authors.initials: NO
authors.lastname: Temajo
authors.affiliation: Institute of Endocrinology and Diabetes, The Children's Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, NSW, Australia. Electronic address: nevilleh@chw.edu.au.
authors.forename: Neville
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Howard
mesh_terms: D001327:Autoimmune Diseases / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology / Q000821:virology*; D015551:Autoimmunity / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology; D006801:Humans; D013312:Stress, Physiological; D017735:Virus Latency; D018406:Virus Physiological Phenomena; D014780:Viruses
keywords: Autoantigens; Autoimmune diseases; Kaleidoscope; Mosaic; Multiple autoimmune syndrome; Stress