Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 1 October 2026 · From issue 45
Impaired control of autoimmunity increases pediatric multiple sclerosis risk in EBNA-1-seropositives and -seronegatives
Brain-attacking antibodies appear in kids with multiple sclerosis, with or without a common virus infection.
Hannes Vietzen, Emmanuelle L. Waubant et al.
Multiple sclerosis is a disease where the body's immune system attacks the brain and spinal cord. A common virus linked to this disease is Epstein-Barr virus. But this study found that brain-targeting antibodies also show up in children who never had that virus infection. The real difference seems to be how well certain immune cells keep these harmful antibodies in check. Those cells are a type of natural killer cell, a kind of immune defender.
Share of virus-positive children with multiple sclerosis who had brain-targeting antibodies, versus 56.3% in healthy virus-positive controls.
548 virus-positive and only 30 virus-negative patients studied, human data.
Integrity screen: passed (3 checks) Checked 2 October 2026. Retraction record: none. DOI resolves at doi.org. Metadata record found (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences). Read the source
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