The gray aspects of white matter disease in multiple sclerosis

摘要

The major inflammatory disease of the central nervous system is multiple sclerosis (MS). It is often considered a 2-stage disease with an initial inflammatory attack on myelin involving the 2 hallmarks of adaptive immunity: antigen-specific T cells and antibodies directed to protein and lipid components of the myelin sheath (1). This concerted attack involving the adaptive immune system is followed by a "degenerative" course involving the myelin itself, the oligodendrocytes that produce it, and the underlying axons and their neuronal cell bodies themselves in the gray matter. All of this culminates in significant cerebral atrophy as MS progresses (2).